Mellor Archaeological Trust - The Eye of the STORM

The Eye of the STORM

Published: 09 January 2019 | Print | Hits: 8983

Drone Mill

The Eye of the STORM
1-day cultural heritage and climate change seminar
Mellor, UK

On 11 December 2018 Mellor Archaeological Trust and the University of Salford hosted an admission-free seminar at the Mellor Parish Centre, close to the Mellor pilot site. The seminar focussed on the issue of climate change effects on cultural heritage in the UK and beyond. The seminar was attended by over 40 guests including STORM partners, other local and national CH projects and the general public.

STORMSem001 Speakers from STORM, including Rosmarie De Wit, Filipa Neto, Mike Nevell, Bob Humphrey-Taylor and Robert Williamson who discussed the impact of climate change on the North-West England region, the Mellor pilot site, and protection of Cultural heritage across the UK and Europe from hazards. This combination of talks highlighted the importance of the STORM project to the UK cultural heritage perspective.

After a short tea and cake break guests were introduced to other similar projects that are being undertaken across the UK and Ireland. Speakers from the CHERISH project, a Wales and Ireland climate change and coastal heritage project, Louise Barker and Sarah Davies, kicked off this section with two really interesting talks, this was followed by the CITiZAN project, where Stephanie Ostrich introduced their project and gave an update on how they are helping CH sites respond to dynamic threats of storms and coastal erosion. Next up was David Knight from Trent and Peak Archaeology who discussed a recent project lo STORMSem013 oking into the effect of climate change and flooding in the Derwent Valley World Heritage Site in Derbyshire England.
Following on from the talks and lunch break were a set of excellent tours of the Mellor Pilot site. Running parallel to one another were tours of the Old Vicarage site, led by Kirsty Whittall of the University of Salford and a great tour of Mellor Mill and its history led by Bob Humphrey-Taylor of Mellor Archaeological Trust.

Following on from the Tours guests returned to the Parish Centre, where Mike Nevell from University of Salford presented, on behalf of Historic England, an interesting presentation on climate change and heritage from a UK policy perspective to really highlight the linkage between all of the projects and the creation of new policies to prevent and mitigate climate change risks. Filipa Neto of Directorate-General for Cultural Heritage finished the talks and gave a presentation that led into a discussion slot in which all speakers were positioned in a panel for a questions, answers and discussion session to cap off a great seminar.

The event was recorded live and a video is currently in production. The video will be posted on the STORM blog once editing has been completed. We would like to thank all guests and speakers from across the STORM project and wider for their attendance and making the day a huge success.