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Friday, 3 August 2007, 12:16 GMT 13:16 UK

Flood relief for Reading Festival

Red hot Chili Peppers frontman Anthony Kiedis The Reading Festival will go ahead despite parts of the site being hit by floods, organisers have said.

Some camping fields were still waterlogged a week after part of the River Thames burst its banks next to the site.

Festival boss Melvin Benn told the BBC: "We're literally pumping water off by the thousands of gallons an hour."

Razorlight, the Red Hot Chili Peppers and The Smashing Pumpkins will headline the event from 24-26 August.

Drying out

"There are vast areas of it that you can actually walk on now," Mr Benn told BBC 6 Music on Wednesday. "It's still waterlogged, but the water's going down."

"I've got a whole team of people doing no more then moving pumps around. I've got two eight inch pumps pumping water directly off the land 24 hours a day at the moment."

Mr Benn also told the NME magazine that 25% of the campsite was under water.

Bad weather has also caused the Fflam and Truck festivals to be cancelled in recent weeks.



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