High Water Mark

Seldon Scott

Halton bridge over the river Lune on Thursday. I regularly travel over this narrow little bridge, maybe 5 times a week, back and forth, for over 10 years. The river here is about as high as I've witnessed it (although I admit when the Lune is as high as this I tend to avoid this particular crossing for the longer, safer way around).

In normal times the base of those X beams are exposed. So the river is in spate, perhaps 6 feet (1.8 metres) higher than usual. You can see from the debris above the road deck that at it's height last weekend, the river was at least another 8-10 feet (2-3 metres) above this level. We had quite a flood.

A record amount of rain fell on the Cumbrian Fells that feed the local rivers. 13.5 inches (341 mm) in 24 hours. It's likely that longer term, weekly and monthly, records will be broken because even now, a week later, it's still bloody raining.

Personally, I'm ok. There's been little serious flooding in Morecambe itself. The town was cut off by flooded roads for a couple of days. We were without electricity from Saturday until Wednesday. So we've been inconvenienced, cold and in the dark for 18 hours a day, but on the plus side we've never been in danger, our home is mostly dry (save the odd leak) and have had the perfect excuse to stay in bed and cuddle to keep warm for many, many hours. Every cloud and all that ;-)

---

View Project: