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I'm assuming you've looked at the sepa flood maps Matt?
I know of the area I think they stay and I have colleagues who work that way (on the railway)
It's not a predicament I'd like to find myself in. Looking at the run off from my street onto the perpendicular ones, I could see minor flooding being a bad enough issue, never mind meters of water.
Historic buildings in particular do not have gutters and roans of a sufficient size to cope with the intense levels of rainfall that we now experience. Soakaways dug 100/50 years ago probably aren’t big enough either.
This has been the problem in recent years at my old house, neighbours old soakaway that couldn't cope or became blocked over years, we've luckily been able to route the water away into other drains.
I’m assuming you’ve looked at the sepa flood maps Matt?
Yep.
And they are slap bang in 'bad bits'. The surface flooding 'worst bit' is literally a trace of thier boundary...
Have fun:
https://flood.firetree.net/embed.php?w=1200&h=700&ll=46.227638,2.213749000000007&zoom=5&m=13
What is the significance of a +13 metres scenario?
+13m is just the default plot on that website. However it’s not the most sophisticated modelling; I’d suggest checking out the various maps from Climate Central that use one of the most up to date digital elevation models and the latest climate science
https://coastal.climatecentral.org
There was a new housing estate built in Chippenham back in the 60’s, called Monkton Park, it sat between the old Calne railway spur and the River Avon. Around the same time, because the river through the centre of town was so shallow, (at times it was almost possible to wade across it), a decision was made to remove the old bridge and replace it with a single concrete span and dredge the river, put in an automatic weir downstream to keep a constant depth of around 15’ through the centre of town, and straighten part of the river downstream of the weir. The town centre used to flood when I was a kid, I can remember a tractor and trailer being used to ferry people across the bridge!
The other thing that showed remarkable foresight was the fact that a bund was built right around Monkton Park estate, and it’s never come close to flooding since.
The park right next to the river close to the town centre has flooded a bit, but it has a dip in it so it tends to fill up with water while the footpath/cycle path doesn’t. Here’s the satellite view of the estate, and you can see how the bund almost exactly follows the river, with the cycle path and footpath running just around the edge.
Who’d a thunk a council would actually think sixty years ahead, and it still being effective!
Here’s the original town bridge, you can see how shallow the upstream river is:
Here’s what the river looks like now looking upstream from the actual bridge now, it’s roughly 15-20’ deep in the middle and the sides slope down about 45°.
Government subsidy - www.floodre.co.uk
The site I linked uses NASA elevation data which is good. It doesn't need a model just an algorithm. There isn't much debate over what goes under at what sea level, the debate is about the rate of sea level rise. My personal view is that climate scientists are being far too cautious in their predictions. They are taking measured rates of change over previous decades and extrapolating those with very modest increases with time. I think they should be taking the highest measured rates now and adding exponentially increasing muliplication factors to account for:
Increases in glacier speed as sea ice melts and no longer holds glacier ice back
The melting of the sea ice will reduce the surface area of ice and reduce its cooling impact on both the sea and atmosphere - sea and atmospheric temperatures will rise faster around Greenland and Antarctica and the rate of ice loss will increase
The rate of increase in CO2 levels is increasing as production increases and sinks decline, the rate of temperature rise will increase - see Hawaii CO2 graph
All of the above will result in much faster ocean warming and thus water expansion as time goes on. It's currently reckoned to account for about a third of the observed rise - that will increase.
The atmopheric temperature at altitude is rising much faster than at sea level. Much of the world's ice is at altitude and will melt faster than predictions based on predicted sea level temperatures.
I think the oft quoted 30cm - 2m by the end of the century is too low and if somebody bothers to put together a model that integrates the factors I've quoted rather than just extrapolating current rates of change the sea level rise predicted will be much higher and more realistic.
Book mark this thread and we'll talk about it again ten years from now.
Edit: I had to edit to include some stupid low predictions that don't even reflect recorded sea level increases over the last couple of decades.
rather than just extrapolating current rates of change
This is not how sea level science is done - the underlying physics you mention is built into the models, and dependant on the future emissions. There are also what we call high-end low-probability (or H++) scenarios which are the highest physically plausible levels (e.g. 15 m by 2300 due to very rapid collapse of Antarctica), which the likes of the nuclear industry take into account.
For the current UK specific predictions see
which will be soon updated inline with the IPCC AR6 projections (note the UK H++ value has not been updated since 2009, this is work in progress), the background to which are given in section 9.6.3 here: https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg1/chapter/chapter-9/
NASA produced a nice visual tool to look at the regional projections from AR6, around the globe, under the different climate scenarios: https://sealevel.nasa.gov/ipcc-ar6-sea-level-projection-tool and a similar tool for the different warning levels can be found at that Climate Central link I posted above.
Yep – Hurt Arms. This October was at least the 3rd major flood in 10 years. And many near misses.
Used to have our club meetings in there ~25 years ago!!
And my old man did the old "build back better" thing, or a similar plan when his last place got flooded (if you search for "yorkshire floods" his house is featured on several news sites!)
All the electrics are fed in from ceiling down, main supply and fuse boxes are ~1.5m from the floor, all the drainage from the house is gated, so it can be closed off. The whole ground floor of the house has been plastered with some special plaster and painted with some semi permeable stuff. Then tiled to 1m, ish. Exterior walls have been repointed with some heavy duty mortar (the original stuff got washed away in one of the floods), they had the properties boundary walls rebuilt, they look the same (quaint piles of rough brick) but have a deep foundation and have a concrete core, there's a manual flood gate where the gate for the drive is (less than a minute to put it into place and lock it). The wall to the river (what causes the flooding obviously) is now a metre higher than it used to be. There's also a large sump and pump under the stairs to prevent ground water flooding.
Anyway, they got flooded 3 times in the first year, they didn't actually get to move back in until they'd been in a rental for over 18 months! Then all the works above were started.
The last flood they had, that actually meant that the neighbour on the other side of the river had to demolish and rebuild... took them about 2 days to clean up after. Basically mopping and washing the walls and floors. Cost them about 1200 quid in bits and pieces that got wet. They could probably even have stayed in the house.
They moved about 3-4 years ago to the top of the biggest hill they could find.
So even with all those works, they couldn't be bothered anymore.
Thanks for the lols Edukator. That’s hopefully an ironic username.
That Met Office report contains exactly the same predictions as I'm critical of, Tasha. The hard blue lines are just a straight line continuation of the 2000-2023 data. The 2002-2023 data are not a straight line, I see the start of an exponential curve.
Check out predictions for the disappearance of the Alpine glaciers over the years. When I first took an interest La Mer de Glace was losing about a meter a year. In 2015 the loss of 3m in a year made a mockery of predictions up to that point and the record losses of 2022 (16m IIRC) and 2023 point to the glacier disappearing much sooner than even quite recent predictions.
I spend quite a lot of time up hills so I get a very real feel for the changes. The inertia of the oceans means that on the coast temperature are rising moderately but measurably. However up the hill the average temperature has risen by 2°C and the temperature on clear nights doesn't go down as it used to. The snow blowers in the local resort haven't seen any use this year. It's 31/12 and we haven't had any cold clear nights. Last Monday it was 1°C on the plain and 8°C at 1400m - the sort of temperature inversion that is increasingly common
There's an acceleration that the Met Office among others is ignoring.
They are model predictions that take into account the physics of the Earth, climate and ice sheets, not extrapolations. And on this one thing I do feel qualified: I am a Professor of sea level change.
I am very pleased that your concerns about the changing climate are as significant as mine.
We looked at a potential holiday home in Wales. It had been on the market for ages mostly due to its historic flooding. Beautiful location, right on the river bank 🙂 From asking around we found out the basement flooded all the time, downstairs every few years and upstairs never. Similar to mert above I wondered if we could make it flood resilient. It needed major refurbishment anyway. Stone floors, High mounted electrics, move the kitchen upstairs (location would've made an upside down house nice anyway, fantastic views up the estuary). It was very cheap. In the end something else came up. Often drive past it. Its still unrenovated.
Edukator I too am glad you are as concerned as the scientists are. I'll reiterate ahsat's point... the projections in the Met Office reports and otherwise are physics based... each element of sea level rise is projected by models taking into account the physical equations and limits of the system. It's not one person in a room drawing a straight line through a graph. Although observations of the past and current do teach us about the physical limits of the system, the sources of sea level variability, interactions between different elements and so on. It's thousands of experts in different fields of Earth / ocean / atmospheric / ice science building and running models and finding both consensus and discrepancy, and looking to understand that.
While the loss of glaciers is tragic, the majority of sea level rise we'll see in the next century is a combination of thermal expansion and Antarctic and Greenland Ice Sheet and they are slow processes - already baked-in to some extent - but slow. The acceleration you 'see' needs to be understood in the physics of the system. As ahsat says there is also huge uncertainty in what future emissions might be, so a number of scenarios are run. (a former sea level scientist, now working for the EA in flood risk.)
What were they thinking ??
Are they hoping that the saving on the property would pay for the insurance costs and all the inevitable losses?
Trouble is money can’t buy you good health. The stress of living in a home that is worthless and could flood all the time just seams ridiculous
Thanks @konagirl. I was only wondering what you were doing now - exciting move to the EA 🙂
And on this one thing I do feel qualified: I am a Professor of sea level change.
And
(a former sea level scientist, now working for the EA in flood risk.)
I've absolutely nothing useful to add to the discussion but I do love it on here when you get proper experts in a subject explaining the how and the why rather than just some random opinions. Thanks to you both!
One slightly unrelated question for @ahsat and @konagirl, how on earth do you not end up going home from work every day thinking that we're all doomed and the planet is truly screwed?
And on this one thing I do feel qualified: I am a Professor of sea level change.
And
(a former sea level scientist, now working for the EA in flood risk.)
Oh thank god two someones more qualified than me. I am more involved in the engineering side of things but I do sit with the people who were involved in the SEPA flood mapping. I imagine ashat has worked with some of my colleagues 🙂
And I manage the (spoiler - not easy) process of turning their ^ expert knowledge into an economically viable, physically possible and socially acceptable process of delivering engineered flood risk management solutions to communities.
Never has IANAE been so relevant, I love it when the experts wade in.
I grew up near Bewdley before they fitted flood defences. The houses on the river flooded every year I seem to remember. One chap had wood panelling on the ground floor hinged along the top edge when the floods came he would pivot it out put legs underneath and put the furniture on top.
I’d either try and sell during a nice hot summer or look at building a garage and nice outdoor living space on the ground floor and living above. Not much use I know and your in laws have my sympathy.
Did the sellers answer any relevant questions truthfully regarding past flooding events? Or did the buyers only find out from neighbours/locals after moving in?
Yep it is depressing but so is war and politics more generally! There is some nice Carbon Literacy training, just keep doing the little things you can and don't feel guilty on an individual level. Ignore the whatabouttery. Make conscious decisions and each of us making small changes can combine to large change - especially when it comes to political change. My personality / skills / strengths are best suited to the science not the political persuasion side of things, so that's what I try and do my best at.
It's an interesting philosophical question about housing, land and asset. and acquired wealth. I mean if the OP's family bought the house as a home with the intention of living in it until they die, then the asset shouldn't really matter, invest now in PRF and expert advice if they can do anything differently with the sump/pump etc and they may enjoy a lovely home most of the time.
One chap had wood panelling on the ground floor hinged along the top edge when the floods came he would pivot it out put legs underneath and put the furniture on top.
As part of post flood studies we often dig up lots of old photos of previous floods. If you back to pre WWII everyone is smiling quite cheerfully from their windows/standing waist deep. I think it was just more normal and less "stuff" to be destroyed.
Did the sellers answer any relevant questions truthfully regarding past flooding events? Or did the buyers only find out from neighbours/locals after moving in?
My in-laws are somewhat 'complex' at times and won't answer that question. I do know the flooding risk was clear on the homebuyers, was highlighted in an email from solicitor, and the physical location of the property doesn't take a genius to have a concern.
"stuff" definitely. We didn't used to have sofas and 50 inch TVs that you can't carry upstairs! What is really sad is when people haven't get any knowledge they might be at risk and had things like family photos stored downstairs. Or lose computers / laptops without a back up of photos. Memory boxes and that kind of thing. In the US or Australia even though they are more 'personal responsibility' type societies, you'll find people have a bushfire plan and a 'grab and go' bag by the door in case they have to leave immediately. I do wonder if we should do better at that side of things, educating and preparedness.
The one advantage of directly working on the field is that you feel you can at least make a small positive contribution. Whereas when it comes to war, homelessness etc, I feel much more helpless. Yes it is depressing, but very much like konagirl says, and much of the public engagement work I have done recently, we try and focus on how individual small actions can all add up to positive change. Yes, it’s not going to solve the major problems, but most of us are not in a position to influence the decision making at COP, for example. Several of my close colleagues are, however, and I know they work very hard doing so (against very difficult global/political backdrops), whilst I focus on delivering the best fundamental science I can.
Those like joshvegas and pictonroad (nice to meet both your professional sides 🙂 ) have much more challenging roles of trying to deliver climate solutions against limited budgets and balancing very complex social-economic-environmental challenges.
I started the thread as I reflected that my relatives cannot be the only ones in this position.
they won’t be the only ones, but there can’t be many cash buyers of £0.5M properties who ignore the advice of their solicitor and buy a property that is so vulnerable can there? I have sympathy for someone who has been in a house for 20 years and then finds themselves in a previously unexpected flood risk, I find it much harder to think that responsibility for solving the problem should rest with society when someone has been clearly warned and therefore either got the property cheap because the whole market knew if was basically part time deep sea world, or they thought they were well enough off not to care.
presumably someone who ended up as a 0.5M cash buyer did so having got lucky on previous property transactions, in which case my sympathy is further diminished, there does seem to be a feeling by a generation that only ever noticed property prices go up that they are entitled to “growth”.
They are not cash buyers.
Did the sellers answer any relevant questions truthfully regarding past flooding events? Or did the buyers only find out from neighbours/locals after moving in?
The past is the past and has no relevance.
The solicitors searches will include current flood maps based on current data. To ignore it is foolish.
The house we bought last year in on the edge of a flood plain, and the ‘low risk’ bit ends not 50yds from our front door. Those 50yds are important though as the road rises 4m. If it gets to us the whole of the Amber Valley is gone!
Loads of people ignore the advice of experts because they think that they know better. Especially when it’s something as emotionally charged as global heating and climate change.
A close friend of mine is a junior doctor and has ended up having to take a one year rental for her current placements, on a flood plain, albeit somewhere that has had a lot of investment in the past 15 years (as that was all that was available nearish a rural GP practice). It has already been a very stressful winter for her, and she can’t wait to get out. I feel for those whom have little choice or been somewhere a long time.
I too think they're f*****d, it won't be mortgageable again, and nobody in their right mind would buy it.
Personally, I'd never buy a house anywhere even remotely likely to flood as the problem is only going to get worse. Rivers won't get dredged due to environmental concerns, upland/wetland restoration will take decades/centuries, and there simply isn't the money or joined up thinking to solve the issue on a regional basis, let alone national.
They are not cash buyers.
in that case I’m surprised their lender was willing to fund it if the situation is so bad. In their shoes I’d certainly be investigating fixing and moving if the market will support selling without being in negative equity. The problem is not going to get better. BUT whatever features attracted them to the property that would not have persuaded you or I, may still mean they love the house more than the downsides (some folk are weird too and seem to revel in living in a crisis so whilst it sounds awful to us, they quite like some drama!)
Bear in mind that plenty of people have always been happy to "buy" leasehold property, where all they are getting is the right to live there for sometimes as little as 70 years or less.
Stuff that is decades away can easily be brushed aside. So what if the property is lost in 100 years? It's the same issue as climate change itself, future harms are easily discounted away to not really matter much.
(Yeah I know the leasehold stuff is finally getting reformed, possibly already has been in England, but it wasn't long ago that it was like that.)
FWIW I don't see my house lasting 100y without a major rebuild, in some countries like Japan properties are routinely rebuilt on a much shorter time scale, it's routine for a house just a few decades old to be worth less than a bare plot would be.
I'm surpised the OP's inlaws got a mortage when the flood risk was well known and highlighted. Saw this house on a bike tour. I was enjoying a few days of flat riding. The Missouri flood plain. I wonder whether bulding on stilts would add much to the cost of a new house. Or garages/basements with high electrics. Not much help for existing homes but going forward.
Maybe it isn’t all such doom and gloom in this case though.
There is a plan for Bridge of Allan to improve the flood resilience of that area of the town, they are well aware that the current walls are inadequate. If you search for SEPA’s top priority schemes you could be forgiven for thinking they were very close to starting work on this. It is also ranked as Stirling council’s number 1 priority. It would also explain why they aren’t improving sump pumps etc at this time - no point if they are planned to be replaced.
The problem is of course money and the council is clearly dragging its feet.
If the work is eventually completed then the house may not be impossible to live in/sell.
Loads of people ignore the advice of experts because they think that they know better. Especially when it’s something as emotionally charged as global heating and climate change.
Especially when you see it on a nice sunny day in August. "That little stream... Pffft" then Boscastle happens.
It is also ranked as Stirling council’s number 1 priority. It would also explain why they aren’t improving sump pumps etc at this time – no point if they are planned to be replaced.
The problem is of course money and the council is clearly dragging its feet.
If the work is eventually completed then the house may not be impossible to live in/sell.
While this is true, it means living there is totally reliant on a sump only a few cm lower than the house and a pump which has failed on them (first inundation). The council I believe has kicked the plan on another year at a meeting a free weeks ago apparently.
Aye, I was trying to look for the positives. That is the situation they are in now though isn’t it. They need to work with the council no matter how infuriating that may be.
They are not cash buyers.
I did wonder where that assumption had crept in.
The assumption was they wouldn't get a mortgage on such a huge risk. But so long as they can pay, the bank doesn't really care.
Or the deposit was large enough to reduce the risk to an acceptable level for the loanee.
One problem with a sump pump is where to pump the water away to. Yes you could build a wall out of 7n structural blocks ,, laid sideways with piers that will hold back enough water for a pump to be viable. What if there is a power cut , you are going to also need a generator. And I doubt a single phase 3kw pump would be sufficient.
As mentioned water will ingress up the poo pipes , and any other point of entry like sink wastes , cellars etc .
Then you still have air bricks , doorways, garage door as points of entry.
I'm looking to blank off 3/4 of the lower airbricks on my place . They are below the door frame and dpc . Living 2mtr above sea level comes with a risk . Unfortunately for me it's more likely cock wombles in 2004 land rover discovery equipped with snorkels who are determined to drive through floods at 30mph to justify the fitting of said snorkels creating large bow waves that will be the problem ,not the sea as it has a huge area to run into, along the road but some people are just dickheads