Storm Frank: Man trapped on Scottish bus in chest-high floodwater for five hours describes his ordeal

Alan Wilson was one of 10 passengers stranded in Ayrshire, Scotland after a bus got stuck in the floods

(PA)

A man who was stranded on a bus in chest-high floodwater has described his five-hour ordeal.

Alan Wilson was one of the last people to be evacuated from the stranded bus in Ayrshire, Scotland after it became submerged in the aftermath of Storm Frank.

The 10 passengers - including two children aged five and seven - were trapped in the bus for nearly five hours before several were winched to safety by a Royal Navy helicopter in the town of Dailley yesterday.

Mr Wilson was eventually rescued by a lifeboat - along with the bus driver and two firefighters on board - after the helicopter which rescued the children and several older people left to refuel but never returned.

He told Sky News: “I moved up to the back of the bus because the water was going down.


 Staff at the Worlds End bar in Dumfries Scotland desperately try to pump floodwater out of the building
 (PA)

“Then the lifeboat came along, I think they tied a couple of ropes so it didn’t get washed away”.

He said a woman who had to been sitting at the front of the bus had to stand on the seats because she could not wade to the back.

Flooding in Dumfries, Scotland on 30 December (Getty)

Police Scotland said they were called to the scene at 1:35pm but everyone had been evacuated by 7pm.

The latest storm to batter Scotland and the north of England caused even more misery to the flood-affected areas when it struck on 29 December.

Storm Frank has caused further devastation across the UK with the partial collapse of a 18th century bridge in Tadcaster, North Yorkshire and a pier in Weston-super-Mare in the Bristol Channel.

There have also been reports of looters targeting flooded homes in Yorkshire in white vans - stealing dry goods and valuables.

Motorcycle clubs from Bradford and the surrounding areas have travelled to the affected villages - Mytholmroyd, Todmorden and Hebden Bridge - to help police carry out patrols of the area.