On Monday 15th October, the atmosphere of the sky portrayed the immersive feel of being trapped inside a 20th century sepia photograph. This ambiance was created by winds pulling up Saharan dust giving the illusion of the red sun we each saw before our eyes. However, there was something odd I noticed regardless of the apocalyptic feel of the world around me; that very day marked 30 years since the Great Storm of 87’ ravaged and caused carnage across London and the whole of the UK. With this uncanny coincidence of two of the most notable natural hazards of our time materializing on the same day, I thought it would suit to re-live the destructive impacts of the ‘Great Storm’ in my local area to mark this anniversary.

On the 15th October 1987, the 'Great Storm' hit South East London with 120mph winds. The damage in the area was cataclysmic on local power supplies, power lines collapsed and trees were uprooted, acting as blockades to roads and railways. Life in Bexley came to a halt.

Hall Place & Gardens invites guests from Sunday 15th October to Sunday 29th October 2017 to their own mark of this anniversary. Images of the aftermath of the storm at Hall Place and various sites in the borough are displayed in the Visitor Centre; open to the public all day and free of charge to see.

The main wall in the Visitor Centre hosts a constellation of images of significant areas in Bexley that were impacted most heavily by the storm. The morning of the 16th October showed the extent of the damage in the light of day, taken by people in the borough the day after the storm. Of the 19 images displayed, Woolwich Road, Abbey Wood is seen to be cropping up more than once. This is personally significant as this is the road on which my mother grew up and my grandmother still lives today.

I questioned my grandmother of the events on the night of the 15th October 1987. She remembers the event as if it occurred just last week and gave me a personal emotive account of the event:

“I was woken by the storm soon to realise that something awful was happening around us; my children screaming on the stairs, clinging to the banisters with white knuckles. After time passed, my husband ventured outside to move his van as advised by the police. On his way to the van he witnessed a tree fall onto next-door’s car, crushing it in half. This was pure luck that it did not fall on the van my husband was moving as he too would have been crushed. Our other neighbours’ had their windows blow in, luckily for us, apart from the disappearance of our fences, our main loss was our apple tree in the back garden which was uprooted and never to be seen again. Among all the chaos, the sound of chainsaws cutting down and moving trees (before the storm blew them over) was the hammering in our heads as well as visions of watching debris and branches swirling around outside our windows.”

Several sites in the borough were chosen to take the debris and burn it, Hall Place was one of these sites. The bonfire at Hall Place was 25ft tall; situated across the river and burned night and day for several months due to the mass extent of the trees that were blown down. The entire clear up and repair operation of Bexley took almost a whole year to complete but its impacts can be clearly re-lived today. I recommend paying a visit to Hall Place and grabbing a slice of cake, looking at the photographs and see if you can perhaps spot where you grew up or a place significant in your life; bring the stories back to life with your relatives in mark of this anniversary.

In comparison, Hurricane Ophelia only caused a naturally aesthetic phenomenon. The 'Great Storm' arrived and left its mark on every one at the time; stories are timeless and the events remain poignant in peoples’ minds today.