Optics battles to beat flood chaos

Some staff and patients struggled to attend appointments amid house flooding, power cuts and traffic disruption across the country.

Hassan Khan, a dispensing optician at Leightons Opticians in Egham, noted residential flooding in nearby Windsor.

He said: ‘Luckily the shop didn’t get flooded, but we had cancellations on the day and some people’s phone lines were down so we couldn’t contact them.’

Another practitioner, in Worcester, said a bridge into the main shopping area had been closed due to flooding, with shoppers originally told to stay at home. Worcestershire County Council later operated a shuttle bus to take people across the flooded area.

‘Some of the bars and restaurants here have been struggling but the Environment Agency and Council have done a really great job,’ said optometrist Victoria Holly Merrett from Actons Opticians in Worcester. Her practice also took to Twitter in a bid to reassure patients it was business as usual.