By Philip Eden
This month marks the fiftieth anniversary of an appalling weather disaster which struck Horncastle in Lincolnshire, a small market-town located some 25km east of Lincoln itself.
A large low pressure system settled over the British Isles during the first week of October 1960 bringing widespread heavy downpours, but there were also some sunny breaks, and when the sun shone it became warm and very humid. On the 6th the temperature reached 21°C at Maldon in Essex, and on the morning of Friday 7th some brief gleams of sunshine again saw the temperature climb quickly. But the rising temperature triggered the rapid build-up of thunder-clouds, and storms broke out at several places in southern, eastern and central England during the afternoon. These were essentially summer thunderstorms even though it was October, with torrential localised cloudbursts and intense electrical activity.
Between midday and 6 pm some 184mm of rain was measured by the local observer at Horncastle, a Mr F J Harvey. He reported that most of the rain fell between 2.30 and 4pm. That is the equivalent of over three months' worth of rain in just 90 minutes. It should also be added that it is highly unlikely that the rain-gauge in the town was precisely at the point of highest rainfall so it is probable that the peak fall was even larger. Nevertheless, this remains the heaviest fall inside a day ever recorded in Lincolnshire. (The UK record is 279mm in 15 hours at Martinstown, Dorset, on July 18 1955).
The high street was turned into a raging torrent which carried away caravans and cars, and large quantities of stock from flooded shops together with household furniture were also swept away to the lower part of the town. A local man was found drowned the following morning, some 100 metres from his home. Over a hundred homes were flooded, and losses were estimated at £100,000 which translates to £1.5 million at today's prices. It was almost a year before several of the worst-damaged houses and shops were again habitable.
About 6km away at Revesby reservoir the total fall from the deluge was 171mm. The duty technician wrote in his log book that the water level in the reservoir rose from 2.5m to 3.5m during the afternoon, while the boiler and filter houses were flooded to a depth of 3m. The nearby River Waring overtopped its banks, flooding hundreds of hectares of farmland.
The Horncastle storm was by no means the only torrential downpour during that early part of October 1960, although it was undoubtedly the most intense. Devon and Dorset were badly hit on the 2nd, with 60mm of rain in two hours at Rousdon, near Lyme Regis; on the 8th 103mm fell at Luxborough in Somerset; and the following day 87mm was measured at Danby Lodge in North Yorkshire.
© Philip Eden