The Duke of Gloucester visited flood-struck Leven and Brandesburton to speak to villagers who were hit by the floods.

Ten weeks after the deluge, some residents still face months of uncertainty as they are waiting for their properties to dry out.

The Duke - who had requested the visit to view the damage for himself - met residents and people involved in the emergency efforts, before going on to visit some of their homes and speak to farmers at the Brandesburton farm of Martin Voase, whose land was left under water by the torrential rain.

He also met members of the Beverley-based charity Real Aid, which has co-ordinated the flood appeal.

Residents told the royal visitor of the horror of watching as the waters rose on June 25, turning roads into rivers and flooding around 50 homes in Leven.

The Duke said later that he had been keen to speak to people to learn what had happened, to find out what the response had been in the short and long-term, and what could be done to prevent it happening again.

"There does not seem to be an answer at the moment but hopefully there will be and some lessons can be learned because it seems likely that this will happen again, and who knows where," he said.

The Duke said villagers who had spoken to him had spoken of the way neighbours had helped each other following the disaster.

He said one resident had told him that she had been able to move back into her council-owned house but her neighbour, who owns her home, would not be able to return for months because insurance companies were taking to long to deal with claims.

The Duke - who arrived by helicopter at Leven Sports Hall to meet the residents, local business people and civic leaders - was greeted by dozens of flag-waving children from Leven School.

Among the residents waiting to meet him were Mrs Karen Langton and her three-year-old son Dylan, who were at the other side of the world in Australia when they received calls from the police to say that their home in Coopers Croft, Leven was flooded.

"We just went into panic mode and disbelief," said Mrs Langton, whose family were in Australia on a business trip.

They returned home to find that both their cars and possessions on the ground floor - including irreplaceable photographs and Dylan's toys had all been destroyed.

"Basically we lost everything downstairs in the house," she said. Mrs Langton said she was pleased that the Duke of Gloucester had asked to visit the village.

"I think it is nice that someone has taken notice because we thought everyone had forgotten us in Leven," she said.

Villager Ian Stones, whose home was also flooded, is a member of the Flood Leven Action Group which is trying to ensure that there is no repeat of the disaster.

Many villagers blame it on a failure to regularly clean out drainage dykes, leaving the huge volume of water with nowhere to go.

"We are trying to find out as much information as we can to make sure it does not happen again," he said.

Mr Voase, who had 150 acres of his land at High Baswick Farm near Brandesburton flooded, gave the Duke a tour of his farm, where the water was up to three feet deep in places at the height of the flood.

Mr Voase lost nearly all his potato harvest as well as part of his crop of oil seed rape. The disaster also affected the quality of some of his wheat crop.

He described to the Duke how water levels had continued to rise for days after the downpour. "The water levels kept rising for the next 10 days because all the water was finding its way onto low lying land," he said. It was a further three weeks before water levels finally started to subside.

Mr Voase believes the problem lies with the lower end of the Holderness Drain between the Great Culvert pumping station near Bransholme in Hull and the River Humber, which did not have enough capacity to take the quantity of water.

He believes there will inevitably be more flooding problems in the future unless action is taken, and hopes the Duke may be able to use his influence to back calls for improvements.

"He took note of all we said and I feel he understood the situation. He said he has no direct access to anyone to say what must be done but he must be a man of influence. He was very easy to get on with and it really was a pleasure to talk to him," he said.