After the memories of 82
How many grandparents of you lot told you about 79 in Cardiff. My wife was with her sister and our niece and nephew at the circus when it was evacuated.
Look at the prices £3 for a bottle of spirits
The day Cardiff went underwater - in the words of the people who were there
Circus animals walked through the city as people paddled down the streets in canoes Boats were used to combat the flood waters on Cardiff's Cowbridge Road East
There were circus animals walking through Cardiff and Christmas trees floating down the street.
Boats and canoes replaced cars and vans while volunteers desperately rescued trapped residents and handed out candles and food.
Emergency services worked around the clock while shopkeepers watched in horror as their entire stock floated away.
This is the story of the last big flood to hit Cardiff and the devastation it caused for hundreds of families just days after Christmas.
It started with heavy rain during December 1979, when a combination of water and snow came crashing down the Valleys to Cardiff.
With a constant downpour over a number of days, the water levels of the River Taff continued to rise until the river finally burst its banks on December 27, leaving large parts of Canton, Pontcanna and Grangetown in water up to five feet deep.
More than 1,000 people had to be evacuated and two people died as the city’s bus fleet became temporary homeless shelters.
Now 60 years old, Cardiff police officer Russell Southwood was 21 at the time of the flood and a new member of the force.
He said: “There was a circus in Sophia Gardens and we had to escort the animals to the Arms Park Stadium in Westgate Street.
“This was before the Taff has burst its banks – the animals came first. I was helping to escort the elephants.”
After water started pouring into houses, however, focus quickly changed to those trapped in their houses. He said: “We were trying to help people who didn’t want to stay in their homes and taking them to higher ground by boat.
“It was a slow process. We had no concept of time, it was just heads to the ground. We were working for 24 hours without any break and then having a rest before going back out.
“The fire service were a great help and the army were called in. At this point the water was at least four or five foot deep.”
For the police officer, one of the most surreal sights was the steady stream of items being swept away down the streets.
He said: “There was food and beer bottles and you could see it just floating down. There were a couple of clothing shops which were badly affected but there wasn’t much looting.
“People were very calm and there was no panic whatsoever. It was surreal, people just listened.
“Shopkeepers took it on the chin but it was the clean up which caused the main concern.”
And it wasn't just emergency services that were called to help.
Returning home from shopping in the Bristol Christmas sales, scuba diver enthusiast Joe Hill was met by policemen on his doorstep in Wyndham Crescent asking permission to use his boat.
Mr Hill, 67, said: "I thought it was a wind-up but they asked if I could help them them. I didn't believe them so I shut the door in their face."
After realising the extent of the situation, though, the crane operator quickly put on his wetsuit bought earlier that day and joined the rest of the Cormorant Scuba Diving Club at the police station.
He said: "We were liaising with the police and ambulance and they would tell us if there was an elderly person or someone with hypothermia and we would get them out, put them in the dinghy and wade them up to higher ground on Llandaff Road.
"Other times we were taking soup and sandwiches to people stuck in their houses."
Armed with canoes and boats belonging to St John's Scout group, the group worked tirelessly for three days, fuelled largely by adrenaline.
Mr Hill said: "One of the first things we were asked to do was take a policeman up Severn Road to turn off one of the alarms.
"An articulated lorry was coming down the road at about 30mph and shattered all the shop windows with the waves. The policeman fell right overboard."
Other memories are still as vibrant today as 30 years ago.
The scuba diver said: "At first it was a shock but as it progressed we did have some laughs. One of the boys was carrying a lady's shopping for her and he went straight down a manhole. There were cabbages floating down the street. His pride was dented but he was okay.
"A lot of people were helping each other. You would see someone wading along the road and people would given them a piggyback home."
Meanwhile, for others working that day there was no time to waste as water continued to pour down Cowbridge Road East.
At 22 years old Denise Williams was making her way to work as a trainee midwife the day after Boxing Day when she was stopped by police.
She said: “I was training as a midwife at St David’s and living in the nurses' home at the University Hospital of Wales.
“I got as far as the animal wall and saw a rowing boat stranded in the middle of the road. I got to Cathedral Road but couldn’t get any further.”
Determined to complete the journey on foot, the water became steadily higher until the midwife was stopped in her tracks by a policeman.
Mrs Williams, 59, added: “I was having second thoughts when a policeman stopped and asked me how tall I was – I’m only 4ft 9ins.
“They got a group of us together and liaised with the fire services so a fire appliance came and drove us across the water.
“I can see exactly why the policeman was concerned, it had to be at least three or three and a half foot deep.”
With the main entrance to the hospital also surrounded by water, the group faced further difficulty reaching the fully-functioning maternity ward on the hospital’s second floor.
Mrs Williams said: “The fire service swung into Neville Street as it was the only dry spot. We had to get in the crane and they lifted us across the road to the hospital.
“At the time it was really exciting and quite an achievement.”
For others, however, the situation was more desperate.
On the day of the flood, Canton resident Lynne Thomas was at home with her tetraplegic son and foster daughter when her husband Ken was sent home from work after a warning was issued over the tannoy.
With water starting to rise, the lorry driver raced straight from their home to the nearest police station, enlisting the help of the officers and a boat to their house near Albert Street to rescue their 11-year-old son.
Mrs Thomas said: “I put my son upstairs as the water got higher. There was no light and no heating.
“The police came in and my husband carried him out to a boat. We paddled to Canton Police station and there was all the St John volunteers there.
Police with a boat in the floodwater (Image: Western Mail Archive)
“They took him to Llandough Hospital and he was there for two weeks as we couldn’t look after him. It was bedlam and it was so cold.
“The most memorable thing was all the burglar alarms going on from every shop and every premises. It was for about three days all day and all night.”
With house insurance less common than today, for some the floods also led to months of saving to fix the damage.
Living in Heath Street in Riverside at the time, Stephen Watkins and his family were trapped upstairs for a number of days waiting for the water to go down.
Mr Watkins said: “I was about 18 at the time and I was working in Brains Brewery. When we knew there would be a flood I got dropped off at St David’s Hospital and as I was going home I could see the water coming down the lanes.
“We rushed to block the door but it was no good and in the next few hours it started coming in, the fridge started floating.
“We were stuck upstairs for three days with my mum, dad and sister.
“We didn’t have a lot in those days and we didn’t have insurance so it was hard times for my parents. It was really upsetting, there was a lot we had to throw out and we had no money to replace it.”
For the 56-year-old one of the worst effects of the flood was not just the ruined furniture but also the smell that followed.
He added: “The smell was still there after six months. A lot of houses didn’t have concrete floors, just floorboards so there was a big gap where the water gathered.
“The mud was all on the floor, all on the furniture – the carpet had to go out.”
Rescue vehicle drives through the flooded streets of Cowbridge Road East, Cardiff (Image: Western Mail Archive)
As the proud owners of their first home in Wells Street in Canton, for Catherine Coulson and husband Malcolm the floods came only days after the pressure of hosting their first family Christmas.
Like others, they were forced to remain trapped in their bedrooms until the water levels dropped enough to start the repairs.
Mrs Coulson, now living in Loughor in Swansea, said: “We had lots of leftovers in the house so that was marvellous.
“It had been raining for several days non-stop and my husband decided to have a look at the river and there was already water on Cathedral Road. He just said we had better get home.
“We moved as much as we could upstairs and had the three-piece suite up on the dining table, put sandbags on the front door and just waited.
“The water didn’t come through the front door, it came from the back and underneath the house.
“It wasn’t just water it was everything that comes with flood water and it just kept coming in. We had five foot of flood water in the kitchen and we have a photo of the water in our front room with all the decorations floating around.
“We had to stay in the front bedroom with all the leftovers and the turkey carcass. It was a few days before the water receded.”
Mrs Coulson added: “The worst thing was people paddling down in canoes to have a look at how bad it was.
“The council gave us a tremendously strong disinfectant to clean it up. For the lad who lived next door it was his first house and knew nothing about it until he got home. He had no insurance, but that was the norm.”
Despite the panic, however, for many their resounding memory is the sense of community the floods brought about. While some were busy moving furniture for neighbours and the elderly, others were busy volunteering at hospitals to move equipment to higher floors.
Grangetown resident Gill Thomas said: “It was the day after Boxing Day and my daughter was about three at the time and was with the in-laws.
“My wife and I decided to have a drink in the Cornwall and it was a perfect storm. It all came together so when the landlord went down to the cellar to change the barrel he found five foot of water.”
After rushing home to Chester Street, Mr Thomas found the street busy with people trying to help.
The 64-year-old said: “The man next door was an elderly fellow and he mentioned he had a pile of sand in the back and that we were welcome to it.
“We went down the street asking the older people if they wanted anything moving and making sandbags.
“There was a good spirit with it all. They were asking for bodies to move equipment, but we had to look after our own houses.”
After the 1979 floods, £3m was spent building flood defences which have protected the city for the past 38 years.
The solid banks you see today between the Millennium Stadium and Fitzhamon Embankment were built. The Taff was widened and deepened with earth and rubble removed from the riverbed and used to shore up defences further up the river.
Even if the Taff breaches its banks at Blackweir, the flat Pontcanna playing fields are surrounded by a second bank, so that they can flood and take the brunt of the excess water without spilling over into residential areas.
But those who remember Cardiff’s last big flood will still keep a wary eye on the river whenever it rains
Dew point starting to fall again now dropped .3% in the last hour to -.2% And temperature is also dropping But its the wind is going from E to NNE to N then rinse and repeat seems to be swirling just to add has gone to ESE but back to the above
