Civil society and flood resilience: Characterising flood risk volunteers and understanding motivations and benefits

In Britain over recent years there have been a number of significant flood events notably in 2007, 2012 and 2013/14. These affected hundreds of thousands of people (The Pitt Review, 2008, Met Office, 2012). In the 2007 floods thirteen people lost their lives (The Pitt Review, 2008). From December 2013 to March 2014 Britain faced further extreme weather with a succession of storms that brought widespread disruption to transport, communications and other important infrastructure (Met Office, 2014). Increasingly, flooding, along with other major events such as fire and climate change, are being considered within the wider context of community resilience. A Strategic National Framework on Community Resilience (Cabinet Office, p4 2011) was produced in 2011. Community Resilience is defined as: