“Some people say the way your year starts is how the year is going to be, so I’m expecting some adventures. I’ll be like Indiana Jones,” said Alina Abroutkouki.
The 40-year-old interior designer spent the first night of the new year sleeping in Didsbury mosque, hours after being evacuated from her nearby home by boat.
She was one of almost a thousand people across Greater Manchester evacuated on New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day – half of them rescued on boats, and many from flooded homes.
Many residents have still not been able to go back, with specialists working to restore power and water, and make people’s homes livable once more.
“It’s horrendous,” Abroutkouki said. “I just want to sleep properly and figure things out, and get the year started.”
She is now staying in a hotel and does not know when she will be able to return home. She has volunteered to help the next time the mosque becomes a haven for people in need.
On New Year’s Day the building was packed with people who had been displaced – some of them refugees who had been staying in a nearby hotel. As council staff worked to find everyone accommodation, local people came to donate blankets, duvets, food and drink.
“All different backgrounds, everybody just came together, and it was incredible to see it, it really was,” said Tracey Pook, a community engagement officer at the mosque. “Honestly, I cannot stress enough how proud I am of the community.”
On Thursday afternoon, the major incident that was declared on New Year’s Day was stood down as emergency services and partners turned their focus to recovery efforts.
“Over the past 36 hours, fire crews have worked tirelessly to keep people safe alongside Greater Manchester police, North West ambulance service, Mountain Rescue, local councils and a range of partners,” said Greater Manchester fire rescue service’s chief fire officer, Dave Russel. “I’d like to thank everyone involved in the response for their hard work and dedication.”
At Meadow Mill in Stockport, recovery trucks were removing vehicles that at one point had been completely submerged in the car park.
Residents waded through sludge clutching carrier bags and bin liners stuffed with their possessions as they moved to hotels or to stay with friends and relatives.
With no power or running water in the building they don’t know when they will be able to return. Some have been told it could be as early as Monday, while others expect to be staying elsewhere for two weeks.
On New Year’s Day, rescuers in boats passed bottled water to those trapped on the lower floors. Some people were stuck inside the building for hours, before being guided down by torchlight and taken to safety.
“The whole Greater Manchester system has pulled together over the past 48 hours,” said Caroline Simpson, the group chief executive for the Greater Manchester combined authority, fire and rescue service and transport authority.
“We are grateful to all those who worked tirelessly over the bank holiday in challenging circumstances to keep our residents safe. Our thoughts go out to all those who have been affected by the flooding. We will continue working together in the coming days and weeks to help residents and businesses to recover and get back to normal.”
Helen Scott, 35, a presenter, had returned to her flat in Meadow Mill on Thursday to pick up her cats Gianni Versace and Alexander McQueen. She will stay with friends until they can all come home. “When you’ve got pets it’s not easy,” she said. “You can’t just rock up to a Premier Inn.”
Scott had arrived home from a night in Manchester’s gay village on New Year’s Eve at about 3.15am to find calf-deep water. When her neighbours came back 30 minutes later, the flood was already chest-deep. “It was apocalyptic,” she said. “Obviously we woke up with a hangover, and couldn’t have felt more sorry for ourselves.”
The one upside, she said, was that neighbours had pulled together and got to know each other better.
Another resident, Scott Adshead, 27, who works in IT, had spent two years restoring a vintage 1970s MG that was completely deluged in the flood waters. “I’d literally just finished building it,” he said. “I’d done everything myself.”
He hopes the car can be salvaged, but it will take a lot of work. “It’s going to be expensive, it’s going to be hard,” he said. “But I’ve done it before, and I can do it again.”
“I’m devastated,” he added. “But the northern mentality is: it is what it is. Onwards and upwards, isn’t it?”
Natasha West, 28, a technical officer for an auditing company who also lives in the building, came home from a friend’s house at about 4am to find the entrance deep under water.
Firefighters told her to stay elsewhere, “but my cat was in there, it was a bit stressful,” she said. She watched footage on the news and spotted the roof of her bright green car underwater, while separated from eight-year-old Kylo.
“Yesterday, I was crying all day,” she said. “The cars are gone, two cars both written off. I finally got the cat about 4pm, the car park was still underwater.”
“It’s awful, not a great start [to the year],” West said. “But it can only get better, right?”
