Bev Banfield was born at Usk in 1966. She went to Uskcv infant school, Usk cv junior school and Caerleon comprehensive school.

In December 1979, when I was 13 years old, we had had very heavy rain for several days. Usk, Gwent was well known for flooding and people were starting to get nervous that it was going to happen again.

Late in the afternoon I remember the fields behind our house, in Priory Gardens, flooding and the water starting to creep along the road towards our house.

My dad had been working away but had heard the flood warnings on the radio, and had telephoned to say, no matter what, he would make it home. And he did, with only minutes to spare.

He managed to seal the doors to our house with sheets of polythene and sand bags. Just as he finished, we were standing in the road, and we all heard the loudest noise, the rushing of the water as the river banks broke.

We saw the water come flooding into the end of our road, and we were up to our knees in water, and most of the houses were immediately flooded.

We tried to cross Maryport Street, from the gulley at the end of Priory Gardens, to get to my grandmother's house in Newmarket Street to see if she was ok, but the water rushing along was too strong and we couldn't make it across.

I remember seeing cars being moved by the force of the water and beer barrels bobbing along.

The next day, when the water had subsided, we could see all the damage. The water had been filthy and left mud and debris everywhere; the clean-up operation went on for days.

Some of the pubs in Bridge Street still have plaques on the wall, showing the height of the water that year, along with floods from previous years.

Bev Banfield, 2002