East Anglia Flood Resilience Information Page

Overview

The purpose of this page is to provide further information to those properties who are in an area at risk of fluvial flooding, but who are not considered to be at significant risk and so will not be able to be taken forward in the Environment Agency's Property Flood Resilience project. Below is further information on flood risk and possible measures to protect your property from flooding.

What is “flood risk”?

“Flood risk” is a combination of the probability and the potential consequences of flooding. Areas at risk of flooding are those at risk of flooding from any source, now or in the future. Sources include rivers and the sea, direct rainfall on the ground surface, rising groundwater, overwhelmed sewers and drainage systems, reservoirs, canals and lakes and other artificial sources. Flood risk also accounts for the interactions between these different sources. 

You can look at the Flood Map for Planning to see what the undefended fluvial (river) and tidal flood zones are for your area at Flood Map for Planning

You can also see long term defended fluvial and tidal flood risk, along with surface water and reservoir flood risk maps at Check Long Term Flood Risk. These show both the potential extent and depths of flooding. Below is a screenshot of the type of maps you can view.

Be prepared for flooding – Flood Warnings

We have a network of both rain gauges and river gauging stations to monitor the height and flow of rivers. If a river level is measured or forecast to reach above a typical range this means flooding is possible, and a flood warning or alert may be issued.

We provide a warning and informing service through Flood Warnings Direct. Alerts and warnings can be sent to you by text message, phone call or email. Please continue to be prepared and resilient towards flooding by signing up to receive advanced warnings of flooding. Register with our Flood Warnings Direct service by visiting our website: www.gov.uk/sign-up-forflood-warnings or call FloodLine on 0345 988 1188. If you are already registered to the Floodline Warning Service, please check if your details need updating by visiting www.fws.environment-agency.gov.uk/app/olr/login

 What is property flood resilience (PFR)?

Property Flood Resilience, known as PFR includes a range of measures which can be installed on a property to reduce the damage caused by flood water entering the property.  The products that can be fitted to a house include, flood doors, automatic airbricks, vent covers, airbrick patches, non-return valves in sewer and drainage pipes, as well as sealing service entry points, weep holes & internal pumps.

 How are properties identified for PFR?

The Environment Agency, in our East Anglia PFR Project, are currently investigating whether PFR may be suitable for use on a number of homes which have recently flooded from main river sources (most notably December 2020). For other properties which potentially may be at high flood risk from main river sources, the Environment Agency have collected data to inform whether the investigation of suitability for PFR may be rolled out to a greater number of homes. We commissioned a property threshold survey of several hundred properties which our flood mapping indicates may be at high risk of flooding from main rivers. We have compared this data to our modelled flood levels. We have also offered PFR Surveys to those properties which the data indicates may be at frequent risk of flooding. More information about this can be found at: https://consult.environment-agency.gov.uk/east-anglia-c-e/prf

Other Useful Links

Flood and water management - Norfolk County Council

Flood management in Suffolk | Suffolk County Council

Essex Flood and Water Management

What should I do? – National Flood Forum

Flood Re - A flood re-insurance scheme

Why your views matter

 If you have questions on the flood risk in your area and how you can reduce your flood risk please contact us via the details below