VIDEO - Flooding hits towns and villages in Caithness
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HOMES, roads and coastal areas felt the impact of heavy rain and strong winds as many parts of Caithness experienced severe flooding.
Extreme weather made its prescence felt across the county on Sunday as rivers burst their banks along with heavy rain causing flooding in towns and villages in the far north.
Halkirk was the worst affected residential area as several fire crews were called out to Church Street to pump water out of the street and from homes.
Several houses on the street were flooded as the drainage system struggled to cope forcing occupants to evacuate.
Shona Horton (44) had only just got out of bed at 8.30am when she noticed her garden was under several inches of water. But she said it wasn’t until firefighters tried to access a blocked drain that water surged into her property.
“I had just got up and I was going outside to see how the weather was when the water was right up to the door verge,” she said.
“The water didn’t enter my house at that point. However, as firemen tried to pump the water away from the home, the drain which they thought they could have used was blocked and it resulted in water entering the home.
“The water reached all of the flooring in the house and we have had to lift up the carpets. It wasn’t even a foot but it takes only a couple of centimetres of water to ruin the flooring.”
In Wick, Harbour Road between Wick Harbour and Bexley Terrace was closed off to the public after a landslide occurred when part of a cliff collapsed on to the road.
Police closed off the road and harbour staff had to ask photographers taking pictures to leave areas which were being hit by giant waves washing giant boulders on to land for their own safety.
In Watten, fields were left submerged as the river burst its banks and roads were also under inches of water.
Sandbanks were put in place at Bank Road to protect homes but it is not thought any properties in the village were damaged as a result of the flooding.
Most of Thurso escaped flooding but The Dammies football pitch, home to Thurso FC, was left almost completely waterlogged.
Thurso Business Park car park also suffered major flooding with cars parked overnight surrounded by water on Sunday.
The weather also led to the erosion of a cliff at Victoria Walk, resulting in the collapse of a railing.
In Castletown, motorists were forced to slowly negotiate their way through flooding on the B876 in the village as the drainage system failed to cope.
Residents on Harland Road also saw their street flooded as people were forced to wear wellington boots to wade through the water to reach the village and get to their vehicles.
Do you have pictures of flooding in Caithness this weekend? Send your pictures to editor@nosn.co.uk. Please send photographs in colour and at least 1MB in size.
Read full coverage in Wednesday's Caithness Courier.
