Digger owners and operators are the true heroes of Glenridding

by Nick Drew | Mon 14 Dec 2015

Digger owners and operators are the true heroes of Glenridding

A heroic team of plant and machinery owners and operators came to the rescue last week in the village of Glenriddig in Cumbria, to perform a massive clear up operation in the aftermath of Storm Desmond.

Many of these owners and operators abandoned their regular work to take machines to the area of devastation, where homes and businesses had been flooded out. On arrival these digger heroes set about clearing out the debris that had been washed down into the Glenridding Beck, to make the river deeper and enable the torrent of water to flow away. The guys from Beckside Hydro were the first on the scene and put their machine to work once they were given access to the Beck.

The volunteer effort involved a number of local companies who all brought in kit to help with the clean-up operation including SER who brought along Volvo A30F dumptrucks and wheeled loading shovels.

Many of the machines worked down in the river itself clearing out the rocks and debris and loading it away onto the ADT’s. Beckside Hydro put their Steelwrist equipped JCB JS220LC to work on this vital part of the job.

Other local firms that were keen to help out included O’Malley’s who brought in excavators from Hyundai and Doosan as everyone came together to as they put it "Do their bit".

On another part of the river Waitings put their not so common, 14 tonne class Wacker Neuson 14504 hydraulic excavator to work as the team worked through the night and into the next day to clear the Beck ahead of more predicted heavy rain.

Other firms who joined the effort included Story’s and G. Lund who a number of JCB machines to work including this 8 tonne class 85 Z-1 zero tailswing model.

One local resident was keen to hail the machine operators as the real heroes saying, “These lads worked right through the night while the government sat in their beds and did nothing!”

One of those operators was Robert Butler who was one of the first on the scene with Beckside Hydro and went straight into action on the company's JCB JS220LC. Robert gave his thoughts on the dramatic events in the following interview video clip. [youtube width="725" height="344"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eMbfXaIJxIM[/youtube] I think you will agree with me that this was a fantastic display of true British grit and determination to come together in times of adversity to help the community who have seen their homes and businesses devastated so close to Christmas, we wish everyone all the best with the continued clean-up efforts. The Digger Man Blog would like to thank Russ of Stevens Equipment Rental for the kind use of their photos in this blog post.

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