ECS Engineering Services to improve safety of flood defence scheme

The Environment Agency (EA) has been working closely with the local council and residents of the North Yorkshire village of Skinningrove to improve the flood defences, following two devastating events in 2000. ECS has recently been contracted to further improve the scheme with the addition of linear actuators that will lower a set of bridge railings to prevent the build up of debris during flood conditions.

The current flood defence scheme involves flood protection walls alongside Skinningrove Beck along with flood doors and collapsible railings located on Stone Row Bridge. This system has been tested in flood conditions and has prevented a repeat of the scenes from 2000, but the speed at which the water level rises has given some cause for concern.

Currently, two local wardens are responsible for monitoring the water levels in the beck and, in the event of possible flood conditions, lowering the railings and closing the flood doors. However, in a recent review of these procedures, it was concluded that there wasn’t always enough time to safely lower all the barriers before the doors needed to be shut.

This led to a design review and the proposal to automate the lowering of the bridge railings using a control panel located adjacent to the flood doors, which would allow the more crucial task of closing the doors to be completed before lowering the railings. The task of implementing this system was awarded to ECS Engineering Services, which will be responsible for installing and commissioning the automated system.

Chris Leary, Operations Manager for ECS, comments: “This scheme aims to improve the speed of response as well as the integrity of the existing defences and thereby provide better protection for the local community.”