More Showers As Waters Recede

Evening Chronicle (Newcastle, England), Sept 10, 2008

MORE showers are expected today and tomorrow, but nothing like the weekend's storms.

But the Environment Agency warned river levels are so high, even slight rainfall could spark fresh flood alerts, although they remain optimistic there will be no repeat of Saturday's disaster.

A spokesperson, said: "There are no new flood warnings or flood watches out for that area at all.

"There is slight rain forecast for tomorrow and Friday. Tomorrow does not look that bad, with just a few outbreaks in the morning.

"We think at the moment that might be likely to raise a few more flood watches in areas where flood watches have already gone off.

"But we think the rivers can probably cope. We are continuing to monitor the situation. We only have a broken down forecast for today and tomorrow, and obviously we rely on the Met office forecasts."

Regional climate change co-ordinator Adrian Hilton believes the floods were a sign of things to come over the next 50 years.

He said: "It's virtually impossible to attribute any one event to climate change.

"However, we have carried out significant modelling of the potential changes for the North East and one of the key outcomes from that is the region is likely to be subjected to more intense rainfall and more extreme weather as time moves on.

"There will be a slight reduction in rainfall over the next 40 years in the North East. However, that rainfall will be more intense with implications such as flooding. The study has located sites which are exposed and one of those is Morpeth."

Disruption caused by the floods is continuing in Newcastle, where Metro services have been suspended between Callerton Parkway and the Airport.

Today, passengers were able to start taking the Metro from Callerton Parkway to Kingston Park. But a replacement bus service is still in operation from 7am to 7pm between Kingston Park and the Airport.

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ON WATCH: Adrian Hilton