Drier than 20 Years Ago

Although it was a damp misty day with some heavy rain it was not as bad as 20th September 2003. The extra is taken from more or less the same spot as today's photograph with an obvious difference. There had been a relatively dry winter and summer and then on the morning of the 20th the heavens opened in an area probably no more than 4 mile radius of Sandwick and created landslides and bringing water and peat down the hillside to bring down bridges, damage the water supply, carry off sheep down the burn to their death and flood houses. The main road was closed between Sumburgh and Lerwick and we had to collect water for ourselves from supplies provided by Scottish Water.  The second extra shows the area of the bridge the next day when the water had subsided.  The local authority sprung into action and things were back to normal fairly quickly.