A WEE COUNTY woman has detailed the shock flood which wreaked havoc on the area in 2008.

Gail Walker told how she and her husband Michael were forced to leave their Tillicoultry home after a "wave of water" spilled inside.

They had only 15 minutes to evacuate their house and only managed to take their two cats and her handbag.

Crucially, she also highlighted the ongoing effects the flood had on her life more than ten years on.

Gail recounted her harrowing tale in a video made by the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) in a bid to highlight precautionary measures that other homeowners can take to minimise the impact of flooding.

She said: "I remember looking around and seeing a wave of water coming across the kitchen floor from outside. We knew that the house was starting to fill with water and we needed to leave the property as soon as possible."

Gail also talk about the aftermath, with the couple suddenly finding themselves homeless.

She added: "We lost all of our furnishings in the house and we lost quite a lot of personal items.

"We salvaged as much as we possibly could and we just had to leave the rest to go into a giant skip.

“At the time you deal with it very calmly, it’s afterwards that it hits you.

"I think that's when you really struggle to deal with the fact that, literally, within 15 minutes, you lose your home – you lose, pretty much its entire contents, and you find yourself homeless."

In the aftermath of the flood, Gail was signed off from work for a week due to trauma.

Looking back on the long-lasting affect the flood has had, Gail admits she has never quite lost the "sense of fear" each time it rains heavily.

As a result, she decided to take action and engaged with Clacks Council over anti-flooding methods.

However, she warns: "I think the hardest part is accepting that protecting your property from flooding is your responsibility. But there are some measures that you can put in place."

Gail’s advice is to put flood gates on your front and back doors and to join SEPA’s flood progress and flood alert system – where officials will call if they think homeowners need to be on the lookout for flooding.