Thousands of homes in Cornwall remain without power or water four days after Storm Goretti battered the region with winds of almost 100mph. As of Monday afternoon, National Grid reported around 1,250 properties still without electricity, mainly near Helston, while South West Water (SWW) said about 3,000 homes lacked water. Cornwall council confirmed 31 schools were closed or opening late.
SWW described the storm's impact on its network as 'devastating', with six major water mains in the Helston area severely damaged by uprooted trees. Sam Bottomley, water services director for Devon and Cornwall, said 30 to 40 trees had fallen, many directly onto mains from the Wendron water treatment works. Repairs are ongoing, with supplies restored to over half of affected customers.
Liberal Democrat MP Andrew George criticised the government for not declaring a national emergency. In a Facebook post, he said: 'If this happened in London or the home counties it would have been headline national news for days and the government would declare a national emergency.' He also hit out at Commons speaker Lindsay Hoyle for failing to grant him a debate on the issue, despite granting one for East Grinstead in Sussex, which suffered water outages affecting 16,500 homes.
George highlighted the severe impact on vulnerable people, including nursing home residents evacuated after their roof was ripped off. He noted that over 50,000 homes in Cornwall and Scilly had experienced water or electricity outages. Meanwhile, MPs called for SWW chief executive David Hinton to be 'moved on' after two major outages in Kent and Sussex in two months.
Janine Williams, landlord of the Blue Anchor pub in Helston, told the BBC: 'It's been a bit of a mess. We've had a lot of people coming in trying to charge their phones.' She added that mains water was cut off again after being restored. On Friday, a man in his 50s was found dead in a caravan after a tree fell on it in the Mawgan area of Helston; his death is not being treated as suspicious.
