Perth and Kinross councillors to examine report reviewing impact of last month's severe weather which flooded over 120 properties

dailyrecord.co.uk:

Perth and Kinross Council’s (PKC) Scrutiny and Performance Committee will this week examine a report reviewing the impact of the extreme flooding last month.A key focus is Perth's North Inch where four floodgates were not closed in time and around 30 properties were flooded.Properties flooded included North Inch Bowling Club and Bell's Sports Centre which suffered significant ground floor damage to its arena, state-of-the art 100+ station gym, squash courts, meeting rooms and changing rooms.PKC has said residents' feedback has been taken into account and is reflected in the report which was written by Head of Environmental and Consumer Services Mark Butterworth and Environment and Infrastructure strategic lead Fraser Crofts.The initial report reviews the impact the severe weather had on residents and services with a particular focus on October 6-8 as well as Storm Babet on October 18-21.

A weather warning was also in place on October 27-29 but "did not result in major flooding".The review identifies "particular circumstances" which are said to have "tested existing arrangements".The report - which will go before PKC's Scrutiny and Performance Committee on Wednesday November 22 - describes the "particular circumstances" as follows: "These included limited staff availability to supplement the standby arrangements with the first incident coinciding with the October holiday period.

This, alongside the volume of rainfall and, for the subsequent events, the saturated catchments following the extreme weather on 6-8 October 2023 and Storm Babet, all combined to create a very specific set of circumstances."On the weekend of October 7 and 8 Perth and Kinross Council's out-of-hours number received 615 calls and 257 were answered.