Family woken by loud banging at 6.30am go downstairs to find their home a scene of devastation

manchestereveningnews.co.uk:

Residents and businesses are counting the cost after flood water destroyed an area of Wigan on New Year’s Day. Water more than four feet deep swamped homes in Templeton Road in Platt Bridge before firefighters arrived by boat to ferry the stricken families to the safety of a nearby McDonald's restaurant.

The water also wrecked thousands of pounds worth of stock at the Iceland and Home Bargains stores on Warrington Road. HGV driver Michael Abram, 46, told how he and wife Stacy, 38, and their three children Jack, aged two, Jake, 10 and Bethany, 12, were woken at 6.30am on New Year's Day by loud banging on the door. "We were being told that our car was underwater," said Michael. "The fire service were brilliant.

They put us in a boat and we were taken to McDonald's. But all the Christmas presents along with everything on the ground floor of our terraced house are gone.

The water has ruined everything. "I can't thank the firefighters enough for saving the urns containing the ashes of my parents Michael and Janet - who both died in 2024 - before the water rose too high.