egret

The power of Romance!

More flooding and 7 hour power cut here last night. At 10.00pm there were sustained winds of 30 to 40 mph.

Sorry but i side with your daughter on this one, banning Youth Club on Valentines Day is tantamount to Child Imprisonment!!!

Hmm, low pressure likely to pass over the Southern part of UK, swell off Sw forecast to be 10m, tides now approaching springs so risk of a surge up the Channel, rivers in full spate - doesn't add up to a pretty picture for places like Christchurch IMO. Fingers crossed for those in vulnerable locations and lets hope this is the last big one for a while.

This is a bit od as the latest (12.09) Met office severe Weather alert for the SW shows it as downgraded to a yellow warning of wind, but the maps continue to show amber. I am taking the yellow warning as being the one intended and expect the maps to be adjusted shortly. That would align with BBC forecasts this morning showing the worst winds to be rather further North.

Interestingly the Meto have just updated their severe weather alerts. Primarily a rain warning 'and gusty winds' for SW on Wednesday and no real warnings for further North. Strange when the fax charts have been showing a deep low.

'Twernt snow, 'twas just the old man brush'n 'is 'air in the rain. LoL Lovely here while the sun has been out.

See this in SW Regional thread - looks to me like it might explain a part of the problem. Amazing that no reference has been made to it thus far: wind gusts got me out of bed, very loud and also hard rain sluice gates not in action

This is most interesting and fits in with one of my suspicions - that the problem is a mix of the sheer volume of water and the capacity of the final outfalls to discharge it. If those sluice gates have been left permanently lowered it is probable that the channel behind them has become heavily silted so even if the gates are raised the flow might still be restricted. I suspect insurers might be interested in that bit of video as it could lead to a mighty negligence claim! Mods - could this post be copied to Somerset Flooding thread where it really ought to be seen. (I don't know how top do that)

Thanks FD, it is good to have some informed input on the subject - I don't know the area well enough other than to have suspicions, hence the questions. I used to live in E Anglia and am familiar with the challenges of reclaimed wetlands there.

Yes, feeling for you, as well as others around the country having sleepless nights associated with storm damage and flooding. Many are clearly now in desperate straits.

Now seeing the real circumstances of the levels (rivers running within dykes, farmland lying below the level of those dykes, huge catchment) it strikes me that there are two issues: 1. How quickly can the rivers drain - how badly are they silted up? They seem to be flowing, is the restriction complained of upstream or at the outfall? 2. The height of river banks is artificial, they are raised to allow rivers to disperse water without routine flooding of farmland. This means that when the river level is high it is above the level of adjacent land. At such times farmlandwill need to be pumped. Presumably these levels form'polders' which attenuate the rate of run off - as have had to be created on other river catchments to prevent spate flooding. Is it credible to provide sufficient pump capacity to cope with the sustained volumes of water which has fallen this year and could the rivers cope with such additional volumes during periods of peak flow? My suspicion is that, given the prolonged and exceptional rainfall, the actual volumes of water that might have been held in the wetlands if they had been drained to a lower level in summer is very marginal and probably a bit of a red herring. There would have been serious flooding this year regardless of that factor. Presumably the land in question falls within that covered by issue 2 above rather than river channels. As regards the need for dredging I am unclear as to where that is considered necessary - in the main river channels associated with issue 1 above which might affect the rate at which the rivers can drain and therefore the length of time that those rivers run at levels above that of adjacent land, or the ditch network associated with farmland (issue 2) I wonder how well they would cope even had they been dredged and suspect that, given the severity of rainfall, the rivers and outfalls would have needed to be very much wider to avoid the flooding. Similar dilemmas exist at so many other places and, logically, we should withdraw from London, Bristol and so many other major settlements if we are unable to tolerate and accept the personal and financial risks associated with flooding. Finally, we need to reflect that in recent years the resources of Government Agencies at local and national level have been decimated by spending cuts. The old posts of Chief Engineer / Borough Engineer used to be well respected professionals in highly responsible posts. Where are they now, who do you actually see managing such matters?

Yes you are spot on, the heavy area has slowed and held back over the Channel - also now less heavy. Steady rain here now but relatively light.

BBC weather presenter added a throwaway comment that she could not see an end to this weather before the end of February. I don't know if that was the official Met Office view or her personal take. There seems to have been a lull in severe weather warning updates from the Metoffice over the past 24 hours after a period of frenetic updates, this despite amber warnings in place for the S Coast. I wonder if their updates are now routed through COBRA before issue due to the political implications of such briefings as conditions become ever more serious?

Met Office Radar looking impressive/alarming for the South Coast - large area of torrential rain arriving perhaps 10.30 onwards. This appears to be earlier and heavier than that shown on their last (amber) warning posted late yesterday morning. If my reading of the radar is correct i am surprised Meto warnings have not been updated this morning as I feel there could be flash flooding as well as deterioration of the background water levels. Edit: radar now showing heaviest rain staying offshore and moderating.

Tipping it down here at the moment with very much heavier rain coming in if the radar is correct. I am surprised that Meto Severe Weather Alert has not been updated today as this rain appears to be arriving much earlier and with more intensity than it previously appeared. The radar echo reads sustained torrential rain for parts of the South Coast when the forecast mentions heavy rain from Thursday afternoon. The last update i have received was 11.32 Yesterday, has anyone received more recent updates?

Did you catch any cod or bass this morning? (I presume you had nipped down for a quick beach session when you took those photos!!)

Yes they migrate in from the swamps to mate at this time of year LoL!

I do hope that one is wrong - it would put an awful lot of properties under water.

A huge gust of wind just now and something quite large went crash outside. We are quite sheltered from the S/SW so I suspect this was a squall that was diving downwards. It will be interesting to look around when I walk the dogs in the morning. Edit: Just investigated what went crash outside - a big sheet of lead 'hip flashing' (probably weighs about 50Kg) has come off our neighbour's roof and is now lying in the drive - fortunately no cars parked there!

Met Office now have warnings out for the entire SW area for the next 5 days - I don't recall having seen that before (for 5 consecutive days).

And hence the saying getting bladdered by the pub run.

We don't know the detailed facts and I should be interested to know whether it is the drainage channels that are causing constriction or whether it is the outfall sluices that are struggling to cope. I suspect the latter might be the case otherwise levels would surely have dropped through water running over fields rather than along rivers - it can still flow. 5 miles by 1m deep water equals one mile by 5 metre deep channel- it can move a lot of water! The permeability / capacity bit is probably part of the problem, there is a limit to the capacity of subsoil . Once that capacity is sated the run off becomes extreme as seen at Boscastle etc. I think we are seeing the same thing but over a more protracted timescale due to the shallower gradients. EA have been warning the SW about saturated ground since well before Christmas.

Agreed , it could be like raking leaves on a windy day - It sounds as though big boulders are really needed! (isn't that why why sand is put into bags at a smaller scale?)

Some of the cloud here is certainly very black despite not being thick, so i have no doubt it is snow cloud. The air temperature however still feels far too warm for any precipitation to remain as snow when it gets to ground level.