UK Victims of 1953 Great Flood to be Commemorated with Memorial

By Vickie Frantz, AccuWeather.com Staff Writer

January 20,2013; 8:42PM,EST

On Jan. 31, 2013, the 60th anniversary of the flood, a memorial stone in the Lincolnshire resort of Mablethorpe, England will be unveiled. The stone is to be a permanent tribute to the 47 lives lost during the Great Flood in Lincolnshire, according to the BBC.
On the night of Jan. 31, a fierce storm brought torrents of rain and strong winds to the eastern coast of England. The storm lasted into the morning hours of Feb. 1. In England alone, 307 people were killed.

The combination of the rain and a high storm surge (caused by the winds across the North Sea) left tens of thousands of people homeless in the U.K., according to thesugargirls.com.

Belgium, England, Scotland and the Netherlands were all impacted by the flood. In all, more than 2,000 people died.
Some of the funds for the memorial were raised by Helen Parkhurst, the former mayor of Mablethorpe and Sutton on Sea.
The memorial stone, made of Norwegian granite, is 6 feet tall and weights six tonnes (more than 13,000 pounds). The memorial is to serve as a reminder that floods, like that of 1953, are still a risk today.