Beneath the Waterline
Phiala Mehring
Visiting Research Fellow, University of Reading, Trustee National Flood Forum, Independent Member Thames RFCC and Sensory Experience Director: MMR Research Worldwide
As the flood season in the UK approaches….. scrap that, with climate change any season is a potential flood season.? Let’s start again.
My research and my (voluntary) work focuses on the human impacts of flooding. Understanding that for people who live at risk of flooding, flooding seeps into every facet of life. It washes away your sense of home as safe and secure place, replacing it with anticipatory fear of having your home inundated with dirty, smelly flood water.
A flood brings with it a tidal wave of emotion: the stress and anguish of water flooding your home, sadness at the loss of precious personal belongings, the fear of rain, anxiety about the return of the flood and the ongoing emotional labour that is required in learning to live at risk of flooding.
Whilst doing my PhD, we, my very very sadly missed supervisor and friend, Prof Jo Clark and I endeavoured to translate this impact into a graphic (which is slightly out of date as I am now a Dr!).? Following my recent blogs focusing on the more human as the most long-lasting impacts of flooding, I thought that this dynamic graphic could help illustrate some of these impacts:
领英推荐
What is my call to arms?? That those involved in flood risk management policy development, those involved in flood risk management on the ground and those that fund flood risk management take a look and start to develop an understanding of flooding through the lens of flood communities.?
My aim? To quote my thesis, is to drop policy hooks and recommendations to ‘float around in the policy primeval soup’ (Bubeck et al., 2017) in the hope that they will influence and shape future policy.?
I only wish that this graphic was an exaggeration.? I suspect it is an underestimation.
Professor in Geomorphology at Trinity College Dublin
5 个月The idea/recommendation of flood communities is excellent and can work.
Chair, Keswick Flood Action Group
5 个月People first. What a lovely idea. But how much of our flood funding is skewed towards biodiversity as the main driver and actual community protection goes way down the list.