TEN years ago, Worcester was hit with severe flooding and one of the places affected was Cherry Orchard Primary School where floodwater began to pour into the school.

The subsequent evacuation of the children on Friday, July 20, was captured in pictures which became our iconic front page the following day.

Ten years to the day, some of those involved with the rescue and the children who were carried out of school that day agreed to meet back at the Timberdine Close School and share their memories with us.

The front page heroes

Stourbridge News:

Police Sergeant Paul Green was pictured on our front page carrying children out of Cherry Orchard Primary School after water began to flood into the school.

He said: "The thing I recall most vividly is the sheer volume of the water.

"You just don't expect to see that sort of thing so far from a river!

"I remember a cast iron storm drain on the car park was lifting four or five feet in the air by a tower of water.

"The other thing was the team work, teachers, parents, firefighters and us in the police.

"There was no moaning, no complaining just a determination to get everyone to safety.

"You just didn't know how bad it was going to get."

Stourbridge News:

Also pictured on our front page was Andrew Chuter who was the local police officer for Battenhall and St Peter's in 2007.

He could not attend our reunion because he has moved to Australia, where he now works for the State government as a Senior Investigator in the Public Advocate’s Office, but sent us his recollections.

He said: "The call came over the radio to attend Cherry Orchard school to assist the Fire Service.

"As I turned into the road leading to the school, I was met by the Fire Brigade and flood water bursting through drain lids with an awful lot of water up to your ankles, which was not stopping due to the pouring rain.

"I was soon informed of the situation with class rooms flooded in most of the school and children in the gym and only a couple of dry rooms.

"I knew due to the amount of children and the rising water that more of my colleagues would be needed.

"The kids were amazing but very frightened and as time went on anxious parents began to show up to collect them but the drain lids and the rising water prevented them from getting to their children.

"Safety was paramount so the fire service and police worked together to get the children out by carrying them through the water with school staff, a real joint effort by everyone all to keep the children safe."

Excited: The rescued children

Stourbridge News:

Stourbridge News:

Carla Maloney was pictured being carried out of Cherry Orchard Primary School by two firefighters.

Now 17, she returned to the school to meet some of those people who helped her classmates at the time.

She said: "I remember all the kids were quite excited.

"We weren't allowed to leave the classrooms for safety reasons.

"I don't remember but my mum said I said the water was up to the tables.

"Our teacher was giving us Maltesers to distract us.

"I had a medical condition so I had to have a back brace and I needed two firemen to carry me out.

"All my friends thought it was a really good thing.

"I thought it was pretty cool at the time.

"I wasn't scared. I was just excited that the lessons were being interfered with.

"I remember a teacher coming in and one by one people leaving.

"I think I was one of the last to go out.

"Then, after, I remember hearing about it on the news and in the papers."

Carenza Jordan, 19, also returned to school for our reunion. She said: "It was just like a normal day and I was in year 4 at the time.

"We were all watching a movie in one of the classrooms and one of the teachers said, 'there's water coming in'.

"We all got really excited.

"It was like an adventure.

"It just kept raining outside and then people started to panic and one of my friends started to worry about their cat.

"The water was up to our knees.

"My dad was the one that rescued me. He carried us out of the school.

"We were excited because school finished but it was scary because water was coming in and we had nowhere to go."

The firefighters story: A tricky rescue

Stourbridge News:

Hereford and Worcester Fire and Rescue's Worcester Retained Crew Commander, Mick Joyner, said: "We turned up to the school and there was water all the way around.

"All the children were in school.

"It was a question of getting them out.

"We obviously couldn't just bring them out or we would have all of the children out of the school and we wouldn't know who had taken which child.

"We had to make sure they were reunited with their parents.

"We devised a system whereby the parents came to someone in the fire brigade who took the child's name and gave them to the police and firefighters or a member of staff.

"They went into the school and collected them and brought the children out to their parents.

"It was something we had to make up on the spot and it worked.

"One of the building merchants in Diglis provided us with sandbags and planks to try and divert the water away from the school.

"That day we were just going from one incident to the next.

"We left the school and went to rescue the people out of the nursing home next door.

"It was a multi-agency operation and we just all mixed in. There was a variety of crews there."

The School: a community comes together

Stourbridge News:

Jeremy Harwood was headteacher at Cherry Orchard Primary School. He is now retired. On the day of the flood he was giving an assembly which had to be cut short as the extent of the flooding problem became apparent.

A decision was taken to evacuate the school and Mr Harwood found himself giving children piggybacks alongside police and firefighters.

Stourbridge News:

He said: "We had been watching the water level rising but it became apparent that we couldn't stay around with water coming in at every door.

"What we tried to do at first was to try and get some of the water off site but we were at the lowest point so anything that drained off came straight back.

"It became obvious that as soon as they were pumping it off, it was coming back on.

"They went through an evacuation plan and came up with the idea of ferrying children with staff and firefighters.

"I think the ones I carried were disappointed. They wanted the firefighters.

"It was an interesting way to end a term. It made for high drama.

"There was going to be a party and that had to be scrapped."

Stourbridge News:

Mr Harwood said once children were safely back to their parents, staff left to try and get home themselves, but the community rallied together the next day.

He said: "The staff were brilliant.

"Staff left the school and the site manager Paul and myself were left just to see how we could secure the school.

"We secured it as best we could and made plans for the following day once the rains had receded.

"Paul was brilliant and helped rescue what we could.

"It was about 9.30am the next day but when I arrived at the school there were carpets being taken out of school.

"It was full of parents, staff and the local community helping out.

"That was just really heartening to see and spoke volumes about how good the parents were.

"It was an amazing sight walking up Timberdine Avenue and thinking the school looks busy and it was full of people starting the process of recovery.

"It was a great sight."

Mr Harwood said the school had known its fields were at risk of flooding but the 2007 floods highlighted how vulnerable it was.

Investment was subsequently made to improve the drainage situation so that the flooding could not reoccur.