I parked the van at the top of the ramp that leads down to the lower esplanade, where
my arcade is situated. The police had cordoned-off the ramp, preventing the public
from venturing down to the beach, which now covered the entire esplanade - there
was no walkway, just beach. When I got to the arcade, I didn't have to unlock the
roller shutter to inspect inside .. ... . because there wasn't one! The wind had completely
blown in the shutter, thus exposing the arcade to everything that could possibly be
thrown at it - wind, rain, sea, beach.
The floor was hidden below five inches of water and machines had just been
uplifted and scattered around like driftwood. Fortunately, most of the wall machines
were relatively undamaged, simply because they were screwed to the walls. Floor-
standing machines hadn't faired so well though, with a few being totally wrecked.
There were two centre-piece machine stands, each supporting six wall machines, that
had been 'blown' to the side, one also toppled over. ..... and I don't believe four strong
men could have lifted either of these an inch off the ground.
Having wasted over an hour just looking at the wreckage that used to be a penny
arcade, I determined that above all else I needed to make the premises secure, which
was easier said than done. I had no tools or materials, and even if I had had a vanload
of power tools they would have been of no use as there was no power. I eventually
drove off to the nearest B&Q and brought back some shuttering ply and two-inch nails
(I had plenty of wood screws at the arcade, but they were of no use as I couldn't drill
holes). I did the best I could, but it wasn ' t brilliant. The following day, Sharron came
down with me, and whilst she tirelessly bailed-out the water with a bucket, I made a
better job of boarding-up the gaping great hole where the shutter used to be.
And so the clear-up began - and boy, did it take some time. Even a couple of
weeks after the storm, I still intended getting the March magazine out fairly early in
the month, as in the Feb. issue (if you can remember back that far) I had announced
that we hoped to be running an auction sometime in May. If the auction was to go
ahead (and at this point, I still intended that it should), then the March and April
magazines would have to be out on time, as the date would need to be confirmed in
the March issue and the entry forms included in the April issue. However, as the days
rolled on, it became clear that the monumental task of getting the arcade up and
running again had to be the priority.
My time was fairly evenly split between working on site, making repairs to the
arcade at Brighton, and repairing and re-building machines at home. Without being
overly optimistic, I had hoped to be ready to open again for the school Easter holidays,
but there were just not enough hours in the day or days in the week, and it didn't
happen. However, I did just about manage to get open for the Easter weekend.
But it wasn't over! There was still tons of work to be done (and still is), just to
get back to the way things were before the storm. One of my biggest problems was
that all my signage was wrecked and needed to be completely re-made. I've already
built new top boards to go above the entrance, which have been very nicely sign-
written, but there is still much to do.
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