Flood risk update

Flood risk update

Written by Defra Press Office

A flood warning sign on a closed country road


Heavy and persistent overnight rain has led to around 90 properties being flooded in Cambridgeshire, Lincolnshire, and Suffolk, with many more properties being protected by Environment Agency defences.

Although this band of rainfall has now passed, there is a continued flood risk as water makes its way through catchments and river levels remain high. The latest information on flood warnings and flood alerts can be found on gov.uk.

While the Met Office has forecast a relatively calm Christmas Day, Storm Bella is expected to bring high winds and further heavy rain moving in from the north on Boxing Day and into the 27th December. This means that there is the possibility of minor flooding in parts of the South West, South East, West Midlands, and North West.

Environment Agency teams have been out on the ground yesterday, overnight, and into today deploying barriers and pumps, working with the emergency services and partners to reduce the risk for communities across the country, and supporting those who have sadly been flooded. This activity will continue over the coming days to keep people safe over Christmas and the New Year.

Caroline Douglass, Flood Duty Manager at the Environment Agency, said:

Heavy and persistent rainfall has led to widespread surface water and river flooding in some communities in the south of England, parts of the Midlands, Lincolnshire and East Anglia, with a number of properties flooded in Cambridgeshire, Buckinghamshire and Bedfordshire.

The flood risk will remain elevated over impacted areas in the coming days, with further rain over the weekend bringing the risk of flooding to the South West, South East, West Midlands and north of England.

Environment Agency teams are working 24/7 alongside the emergency services and local partners to support those who have been flooded, reduce the risk of further flooding and keep communities safe through the festive period.

We urge people to keep away from swollen rivers and not to drive through flood water – it is often deeper than it looks and just 30cm of flowing water is enough to float your car.   

People should check their flood risk, sign up for free flood warnings and keep up to date with the latest situation at via Gov.uk or follow @EnvAgency on Twitter for the latest flood updates.

Follow Defra on Twitter, and sign up for email alerts here.

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[roscoe erf]

get mr price on the job he will sort it for you

 

[holwellcourtfarm]

Must be devastating for those flooded yesterday to have women up to Christmas in a flooded house. My heart goes out to them.

 

[quattro]

I wonder if anyone from ea management lives in a house that has flooded

 

[holwellcourtfarm]

I wonder if anyone from ea management lives in a house that has flooded

A colleague of mine had to abandon flood emergency response to go home and move his furniture in 1993, missed flooding into the house by about 1/2 inch.

Some years ago the Anglian region flood risk manager lived in a house on the coast he'd bought after it flooded from the sea, they refurbished it to be fully "flood tolerant" and had it flood afterwards at least once.

Nobody workout in flood response makes light of houses flooding. Most have personally witnessed it and you don't forget that.

 

[Gordy1]

Our house was flooded out three times when I was a school lad in the sixties due to a brook overflowing in the village, after the third time the WVS now known as the WRVS found us temporary accommodation while parent dried it out etc after that the water board now the EA had a team of men down to clean the brook up by hand & every year they would do it again, haven’t seen the EA about much since they took over so we do the job ourselves & they let us get on with it if we didn’t we would probably get flooded again.

 

[Muddyroads]

Must be devastating for those flooded yesterday to have women up to Christmas in a flooded house. My heart goes out to them.

I know this is a serious matter and I really feel for those affected, but I had to read this 3 times before the typo made sense!

 

[holwellcourtfarm]

I know this is a serious matter and I really feel for those affected, but I had to read this 3 times before the typo made sense!

Whoops, guilty as charged. I must check more before I post.

Should have read "woken" not women of course.

 

[puppet]

Forget the flooding, concentrate on dealing with the women.