is estimated as £50 million at 1953 prices, approximately £1.2 billion at 2013 prices. Probably the most devastating storm to affect Scotland for 500 years, the surge crossed between Orkney and Shetland. The storm generated coastal and inland hazards, including flooding, erosion, destruction of coastal defences, and widespread wind damage. Damage occurred throughout the country, with 19 fatalities reported. The fishing village of Crovie (then in Banffshire, now Aberdeenshire), built on a narrow strip of land along the Moray Firth coast, was abandoned by many, as large structures were swept into the sea. The surge raced down the east coast into the mid-to-southern North Sea, where it was amplified by shallower waters. On the north side of the Thames Estuary Canvey Island in Essex was inundated, with the loss of 58 lives. Some 41 people died at Felixstowe in Suffolk when wooden prefabricated homes in the West End of the town were flooded. Another 37 died when the seafront village of Jaywick near Clacton was flooded. In Lincolnshire, flooding occurred from Mablethorpe to Skegness, reaching as far as inland. Police Officers Charles Lewis and Leonard Deptford received George Medals for their part in rescue work. Lewis leapt from a police station upper window to save an elderly couple being swept away in floodwater, carrying them to a house across the road to safety, then continuing rescue work for hours until he found a working telephone to call for help. Deptford was off-duty at his son's party when the wall of water hit. He realised that elderly people were vulnerable as the sea wall was breached and he dragged and carried many to safety. At one house he found a bedridden elderly couple with their middle-aged daughter; in the waist-high floodwater, he lashed together oil cans to make a raft, to which he tied the couple and pulled them to safety. He carried on into day light, his last rescue being a dog. Reis Leming, a US airman, and USAF Staff Sergeant Freeman A Kilpatrick were also awarded the George Medal for rescuing respectively 27 and 18 people at South Beach, Hunstanton. At Salthouse the Victorian Randall's Folly was badly damaged, resulting in its subsequent demolition. In south-west Essex, water overspilled the Royal Docks into Silvertown, where it drained into the sewers but flooded back in Canning Town and Tidal Basin. William Hayward, a night watchman at William Ritchie & Son,