Military helicopters winched dozens of people to safety and emergency workers in inflatable boats rescued scores more as floods on Friday swamped northern England's picturesque Lake District. One police officer died after a bridge was swept away by the surging waters.
British soldiers conducted house-to-house searches for those trapped by floods as deep as 8 feet (2.5 meters). Troops also dropped down on lines from air force helicopters, breaking through rooftops to pluck people to safety.
Emergency services said more than 200 people were rescued in the hardest-hit town, Cockermouth. At least 960 homes were flooded after a day of unprecedented rain, police in the northern region of Cumbria said.
Heavy rain and gales also brought widespread flooding to Ireland, as more than 3 feet (1 meter) of water shut down the center of the country's second-largest city, Cork, and more than a dozen towns and villages.
Cockermouth, a market town 330 miles (530 kilometers) northwest of London, lies at the junction of the Cocker and Derwent rivers and is known for being the birthplace of poet William Wordsworth.
"It has devastated the town," said Michael Dunn, manager of the Bitter End pub in Cockermouth. "There is a lot of properties in Main Street, private shops, that have had their windows smashed in by the force of the water and by debris in the water.
"There were cars floating down the street. It will be a long time before Cockermouth recovers from this."
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