Cameron to visit flood-hit areas of Britain

Britain’s Prime Minister David Cameron will chair a meeting of the government’s emergency committee later today to discuss severe flooding in north west England where thousands of homes were without power for a second day.

Police reported that they are trying to recover the body following reports that an elderly man had fallen in the water.

The deluge left Carlisle, a city in Cumbria underwater, with hundreds of homes submerged, and many rivers breaching their banks.

In Cumbria, the worst hit county, several bridges and roads have been washed away and many others declared unsafe for the meantime while checks take place.

Police are reporting a 90-year-old man in London, which was experiencing extremely heavy winds, was blown into the side of a moving bus.

The Met Office’s highest red warning has been issued for Cumbria and south-west Scotland, with some areas recording 341mm of rain falling in just 24 hours – thought to be the highest recorded rainfall in England since records began.

The rail network in Cumbria remained “basically at a standstill”, he added.

The Prime Minister’s spokeswoman said ministers had discussed whether official forecasts underestimate the risk to flood defences.

“Members of the Warrington fire crew also worked in the Eden park crescent area of Carlisle, where they evacuated and rescued two adults from a property using the boat”.

Cumbria County Council leader Stewart Young told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme: “There does need to be an investigation into the flood defences”.

Environment Secretary Liz Truss claimed flood defences had protected as many as 8,000 homes the north of England.

Drone footage shot above Kendal, a flood-hit town in Cumbria, shows the flooded cricket ground and people wading through inches of water.

She will set out more details of the Government’s response in an oral statement to the House of Commons on Monday afternoon. “But it’s important to say that many households were protected by our defences”.

The current floods are said to be the worst in the U.K.in 10 years as some areas received record high rainfalls. The northwest region was badly flooded in both 2009 and 2005.

A spokesman for the company said: “We tried everything we could to protect Carlisle but unfortunately this is an unprecedented flooding event”.