How the Red Cross helped save lives in Northern Ireland flooding

With 63 per cent of the average August rainfall coming down in just nine hours, the Fire Service estimated that it fielded a call for help every 45 seconds after roads and bridges collapsed, and dozens of people were trapped in their homes or cars.

Also on the scene with the emergency services was the Red Cross, as Debbie Caulfield of Eglinton Community Hall described.

“It was very traumatic for everyone involved,” she says. “There were many people out of their homes, some of them for almost six months.

“The thing that I found most traumatic was that many of the people flooded were families with young children, or older people who, because they lived in bungalows, lost of all their possessions, and that included their memories. They’d lost all their photographs of their children, their grandchildren, maybe their wedding photographs, everything that they had, and as we become more aware of how important memory is to mental health, and how old photographs can be helpful if they suffer from dementia or memory loss, I found that emotional side of it difficult.”

The rain may have fallen mostly on that evening, but the consequences were life-changing for many residents.

“The rain that fell was extraordinary. I think we were very lucky that nobody died in Eglinton that night,” Debbie adds. “People described it as like pulling the plug out of the bath, and the water getting away really, really quickly.

“In some of the social housing, [they had to] rip everything out of the houses, and it was just four walls until they rebuilt them again.”

The work of the emergency services cannot be understated, but as fast as anyone on the ground was the Red Cross – a fact that has not been forgotten in the community.

“The Red Cross was on the ground before we even realised they were on the ground; even by the time that I got down to Eglinton Community Hall, volunteer Allistair McFarland was already there.

“I found throughout the period afterwards that they continued to support us; they were with us all day, every day, for about 14 days. The Red Cross would have delivered food out for us, and they put a Listening Ears service in place for us very quickly, to be able to help people who were in crisis. We found that absolutely invaluable, and that fondness for the Red Cross is certainly there in the village, with the time and effort they put in here.

“The support continued even through that winter for people in the caravans, when their volunteers would’ve come down and knocked doors and asked how people were doing, or whether there were any referrals they could make to social services or anything like that.”

Not only were the actions of the Red Cross imperative in the efforts to help people, but so was its experience of similar situations.

“It felt like it was never going to end for us, and the Red Cross helped us stand down at the community hall.

“The Red Cross gave us the benefit of their experience over the years, experience which we didn’t have. It was so important to have someone to be able to stand it down, to where you didn’t feel like you were there for people one day and not the next.

“It was invaluable to have that support.”

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