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Weather : past adverse weather in Birmingham

Hi Bob,
If you click on the link and run the webcam they switch views and eventually you will see Verity in all her glory.
Here she is standing there in all sorts of weather ...
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oldmohawk
 
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Yes Bob Mum was a member of the local WI and helped man there tea and cake stand in the town centre on Tar barrel night.
Sadly they have both passed away now.
I went to a couple of those nights, loved it, absolute madness. Great tradition that the elf and safety haven't managed to stop so far. I believe up to now no one has been badly injured, just minor burns. I guess its only a matter of time before someone is and then it will be stopped. I hope not.
 
I don't remember Verity oldmohawk from the last time I was Ilfracombe some years ago now, and I'm sure I would have remembered her! Is she a recent addition?
Just looked it up, apparently been there since 2012.
Quite controversial I would imagine, wonder what the locals think.
 
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phil you know when they call out the weather for fishing areas....isnt varity one of them?...this has just come back to me from the days when i listened to world service on the radio

lyn
 
Elmdon Boy said:
I don't remember Verity oldmohawk from the last time I was Ilfracombe some years ago now, and I'm sure I would have remembered her! Is she a recent addition?
Just looked it up, apparently been there since 2012.
Quite controversial I would imagine, wonder what the locals think.
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It is an unusual statue 66ft tall and and latest generally favourable comments and controversial pics from a local paper five years on can be read from the link below.
https://www.devonlive.com/news/devon-news/five-years-verity-how-damien-597690
I first visited Ilfracombe in the 1950s arriving by steam train and one highlight was a trip by paddle steamer to Lundy Isle so I'm of a generation preferring victorian style statues ....:D
 
Astoness said:
phil you know when they call out the weather for fishing areas....isnt varity one of them?...this has just come back to me from the days when i listened to world service on the radio

lyn
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Hi Lyn,
I think it was Cromerty. The shipping forecast is still broadcast and one wonders whether any fishermen listen to it when so much info can be obtained from the internet and satellites etc.
Phil
 
Smudger said:
Brilliant statue. By Anthony Gormley? She looks pregnant, & is that an open ended spanner in her right hand?
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Basically a fill in for all interested. The sculptor was Damian Hirst, who has loaned it to the town for twenty years. In her right hand are the scales of Justice and she is standing on a pile of law books. There was a great deal of controversy and it was very much a split of the locals as to whether they liked it/wanted it/ needed it. She was tested in a wind tunnel before erection. She has brought a lot of visitors to the town which had been crumbling and dying since the closure of the railway line, another mistake in hindsight, it did not close until 1969, but in reality should have been recognised as a place that needed a good transport link. The bus services that replaced it were insufficient in numbers and timing and of course in summer with all the holiday makers, terrible traffic jams still occur..Ilfracombe to Barnstaple 12/13 miles, want the 10.45 train, leave Ilfracombe on a Saturday morning by at least 0830hrs, possibly earlier. Hirst opened up a wine bar along the road that leads to the Harbour, but this has recently closed, there is also a much debated scheme to build a large number of houses, currently in abeyance. The steam train trip to Ilfracombe from Birmingham was an interesting one, the train went from Snow Hill, was the Wolverhampton- Ilfracombe/Minehead (this one usually split at Taunton and ran early in the season and late at the end of season, otherwise the train were Wolverhampton - Ilfracombe, Wolverhampton- Minehead. From Taunton the ilfracombe train was hauled by a western 2-6-0 tender class taking up to two and a half hours to cover the 70plus miiles. It went into Barnstaple Victoria Road, where a Southern pilot was attached to the back and then was reversed into Barnstaple Junction, where the pilot detached and often at the height of summer a West Country class Southern engine was attached and hauled to Ilfracombe, where the station was high up on the east side of the town and quite a distance from the town.
OM thanks for printing the picture, it is a good one.
Elmdon Boy, sorry for your loss, yes elfndafety tried to interfere, but it is still being done annually, with even youngsters carrying barrels of blazing tar.
Radiorails, thanks for the map, my wife needed that for a craft project and I kept promising to print one off.
Bob
 
Way back in 1954 I made the 7 hour train journey from Moor St Station starting at midnight and remember the 3 point turn in Barnstaple and the photo below shows the engine type which pulled us into Ilfracombe. To bring in a weather comment, we camped at Combe Martin for 2 weeks under clear blue skies every day .... and the resultant sun tan can be seen in a post here https://birminghamhistory.co.uk/for...olidays-in-woolacomb.16566/page-4#post-284225
devonjim said:
That single track branch line has long since gone. Now the Tarka trail.View attachment 106697
Such a train pulling out of Barnstaple Junction to cross the Taw enroute to Ilfracombe.
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from https://birminghamhistory.co.uk/for...d-memories-of-trains.46443/page-3#post-569672 image only visible if logged in
 
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Verity,I would have to say, I'm not keen on it. Wouldn't want to see it in the centre of Brum.
Definatly a Marmite reaction, you would either love it or hate it.
I guess it has bought trade to Ilfracombe , but should that be a reason for putting up a controversial statue.
Why was she called Verity?
 
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oldMohawk said:
Sorry I have no info about the pic which was posted by devonjim, see link to his post. It was certainly that type of engine and I remember as it climbed out of Ilfracombe the wheels occasionally slipped with much engine noise. Steam on the branch ran until 1964 and the line finally closed in October 1970.
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In 1970, we had moved up to Braunton from Plymouth and for some reason decided in September to take the train to Barnstaple for a change...two weeks later it was gone, but the ride from Barnstaple to Exeter which still exists is probably (Dawlish coast line excepted) one of the prettiest in the country. Of all the express type preserved locomotives, the West Countries and Battle of Britain are probably the most of any one sort, running the rails of Great Britain, some are still in original 'spam can' form, but most are in rebuilt form. Braunto is owned by and runs on the West Somerset Railway, ironically it was very rarely seen in North Devon, being in the main a Nine Elms engine. On your break in Woolacombe, you must have chosen the right year to come, most summers we endure Devonshire liquid sunshine. Reverting to the theme Weather, the sun is shining here today.
Bob
 
Bob Davis said:
In 1970, we had moved up to Braunton from Plymouth and for some reason decided in September to take the train to Barnstaple for a change...two weeks later it was gone, but the ride from Barnstaple to Exeter which still exists is probably (Dawlish coast line excepted) one of the prettiest in the country. Of all the express type preserved locomotives, the West Countries and Battle of Britain are probably the most of any one sort, running the rails of Great Britain, some are still in original 'spam can' form, but most are in rebuilt form. Braunto is owned by and runs on the West Somerset Railway, ironically it was very rarely seen in North Devon, being in the main a Nine Elms engine. On your break in Woolacombe, you must have chosen the right year to come, most summers we endure Devonshire liquid sunshine. Reverting to the theme Weather, the sun is shining here today.
Bob
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I went to Woolacombe almost every year from 1972 until 2003 and rarely had bad weather. It is such a nice place that it has its own thread here
https://birminghamhistory.co.uk/for...past-holidays-in-woolacomb.16566/#post-126252 edit - thread title now corrected.
It is not easy to search for because the 'e' was missed from it's name in the thread title !!
Many photos were lost in the 2011 hack but I replaced mine.
oldmohawk ... :)
 
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With regard to #54 prior to coming to live in Oz in 1961 I was a happy member of The Cherubs Motor Scooter Club ( we only rode scooters so we were too small to be Hell's Angels !).
Long story short we went for a day out to Warwick and it rained all day, solid. On our return I came round the bend at that spot in Greet and the road was flooded and a lone policeman was posted to redirect the traffic. I think it would have been 1960 but this picture brought it right back to me !
 
Witton was flooded again on Saturday last but not to the same degree as above.
However, it's not just road works that close the Chester Road - this happened in next to no time. The car pictured is stuck as have countless others been over the years. One minute we were walking along Marsh Lane in sweltering heat and then the heavens opened with lots of hail and rain. The water is much deeper further in.
 

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Watching the news this morning it appears that the south of Birmingham has been badly hit by the storms. Water is half way up cars parked in the streets. Two inches of rain fell in an hour but it seemed much more when it came down here. Hope everyone is OK and hasn't been too badly affected. Our gutters (between the houses) couldn't cope and the garage was flooded. No real damage as it didn't get to the freezer.
 
I had spent a lovely sunny blue sky day in Yorkshire and was a bit surprised having to drive home through a river running in Thornhill Rd Streetly ... I had missed it all ...
ThornhillRd.jpg
 
It seems that many parts of the Midlands has had torrential rain. Notable areas are those near the small, shallow rivers such as the Cole, Rea, Tame and Blythe. Some photos show cars travelling through the waters at far too great a speed, causing bow waves which push even more water into already flooded property.
I have seen this many times in the past and it is quite distressing to those whose property is already affected or threatened.
 
Yes I already saw the MD floods Eric on Fox 6. Reminded me of some in Italy a few years ago. The South West get serious floods as water sweepes down valleys: Lynmouth twice, Boscastle etc.
 
7th June 1933, Birmingham Gazette...No Break in the Heatwave

(The heat is getting to me, please read last first)

FED47FBD-F293-4537-A5DF-4D52D1131CAC.jpeg 103A9446-B47F-4B6E-A215-C8C840393E5A.jpeg FE58D238-D0BE-43DA-BF1A-D3E8DEFE4B69.jpeg
 
Can anyone tell me how long the 1976 heatwave lasted? I was working in an office with huge windows at the time and it seemed never ending. However, I had saved to take my little girl on holiday to Paignton. It rained nearly every day of our holiday!
 
The rain started, in South Devon, anyway on 28th. August that year. I was overjoyed; I had spent over two months at fires over much of South and West Devon and of course Dartmoor.
 
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