Staff at flooded care home praised for teamwork during resident evacuation

Care staff at the White House care home in Datchet have been praised for their quick reactions and teamwork after successfully evacuating seven residents from the recently flooded care home.

The home is part of Choice Care Group, and provides residential care to adults with learning disabilities including autism and downs syndrome.

The threat of flooding became a reality for the home after a combination of heavy rainfall and its location between a reservoir and a lake caused water to enter home, flooding the boiler room and causing the home’s central heating to stop working.

Home manager, Diane Grist said: “We were flooded earlier in the year but it was nowhere near as bad as this. Thankfully, everyone pulled together and we were able to get everyone out safely and then ensure that they had somewhere to stay where their needs would be met. The service users themselves were absolutely fine, with some of them taking the change of accommodation to be like having an extra holiday.

“Luckily, we’ve had no damage to the main house and we managed to get the power and central heating back on without any problems. Our day rooms flooded, but we’re drying them out now.”

All residents were evacuated to safety and while some moved into other of Choice’s care homes, three were taken to their family homes until 18 February when it was confirmed the home did not have any serious damage and power was restored to the home.

Staff members were praised for their commitment and teamwork, with some working extra hours to ensure residents who had moved to other care homes were able to receive consistent levels of support and care.

Edwina Johnston, chief executive of Choice Care Group, said: “I would like to commend everyone involved who helped ensure that our service users were safely evacuated.

“Staff worked around the clock to ensure that a difficult situation was handled as effectively as possible. We have always promoted the importance of teamwork at Choice and this is a fantastic example of that ethos in action and proof that our business continuity plan works!”