Snow melt

With temperatures jumping from below freezing to just under 10ºC (50ºF) virtually overnight, the snow melt came quickly. Hooray... at least in many ways. I made it to the supermarket on Monday to replenish my food stocks, though at that stage there was still plenty of snow and ice lying about. Even the supermarket car park was a bit tricky to negotiate in parts. By Tuesday morning, however, all the snow had virtually disappeared, a welcome, if rather surprising, sight when I opened my curtains. 

Rapid snow melt does, however, lead to rapid rises in river levels. The Aire was churning over Hirst Weir and just beginning to flood the riverside footpath. A couple walking ahead of me turned back, saying the path was underwater further along, at the bridge where a small stream joins. So I only ventured as far as the Rowing Club HQ. I think it will get worse before it gets better, though I don't think much rain is forecast. Snow melting off the fell sides in the Dales will no doubt make its way down to us in the next few days. 

 

Spoke too soon!

Following on from yesterday's post (and as if to say 'you spoke too soon!') the weather suddenly decided it had had enough of the calm, boring stuff. On New Year's Eve, up and down the country, it turned much colder, with strong winds and torrential rain. Many of the NY celebrations had to be called off, including the Edinburgh Hogmanay spectacular. It wasn't too bad here though the rain lashed down all night. The neighbouring Calder and Wharfe valleys seem to have been hit harder, with some flooding of roads. 

Then suddenly, around 1pm on New Year's Day, the rain stopped and the sun came out. The interlude didn't last all that long but I decided to make the most of it with a brisk walk down to Roberts Park. The River Aire was just straying beyond its banks in the park, swallowing up some of the footpath. The weir was roaring magnificently. We shall have to see if it gets worse or better over the next few days, which really depends on the situation further upstream in the Dales. 

Blocked

Everything is blocked! The purchase of my new flat is still stalled, and I have as yet no idea of a moving date. I'm sure it won't be too long now and suddenly everything will be frantic but right now I'm still twiddling my thumbs and trying to keep myself occupied. After a day of heavy rain on Monday, Tuesday was brighter so I went for a walk. Salts Mill is closed on Tuesdays so the paths through the mill yard were blocked. The canal towpath is blocked off for repairs. 

Walking across the footbridge into the park, I could see the river was pretty high, though just about within its banks. 

Up at Hirst Weir, the river had overtopped the bank and looked as though it was now receding a little, leaving huge puddles to reflect the blue sky. The ducks were exploring beyond where they can normally go. 

The depth marker was almost submerged. (I wouldn't fancy living in that house opposite. I presume they have some flood barriers but it still looks quite vulnerable.) A man walking his dog reported that the riverside path was impassable unless you had wellies. I didn't, so I turned round and went back.... Blocked at every turn! 

York floods

I made a visit to York at the weekend; such a lovely, interesting and historic city. When it rains in the Dales and in the valleys up here, all that water makes its way downstream to join the River Ouse which flows through York. It's a fairly regular occurrence therefore that the city floods, at least along the riverbanks. The businesses along here are used to it and have measures in place that mean they can recover fairly quickly, though it must get tedious. Flood alleviation schemes have been installed, so to some extent the flooding you see now is part of what they have decided is acceptable disruption. It's the first time I've ever visited the city when it has been flooded and could see for myself what they have to contend with. It was clear that the water level had already dropped by a couple of feet - you can see the high watermark on the wall of the pub (above). Normally this area looks like THIS.  Some of the paths I walked along were slippery with mud and had obviously recently been underwater and the river was much wider than it normally is, with the riverside promenades completely submerged. The rest of the city carries on as normal. 

Turbulence

The Aire was as full as it could be without actually flooding after Storm Debi, our fourth named storm in a few weeks. Honestly, it feels as though it has been raining almost constantly since mid-July, save for the odd sunny day here and there. The newly-laid riverside path was inundated in a few places so my walk was a bit of a paddle in parts. The water has a lot of power when it is like this, and I'd be worried if I lived in one of those riverside properties as there is no sign of a let-up in the rain and there is flooding up in the Dales. Along with the high water, there were a few trees down in the woods. The wind has been gale force, although it was strangely calm by the time I went out. I had to limbo nimbly under some branches blocking the path - not easy when I had a good many layers on, which made it harder to bend - though it actually wasn't as cold as I'd expected due to the lack of wind. Bin collection day tomorrow (as I write this) so let's hope the wind stays away or everywhere will be littered

Storm Babet

Ever since they started naming storms, the weather seems to have got a bit above itself. It definitely has a swagger to it! Storm Babet swept in over the past few days, bringing torrential rain and high winds across much of the country. It was particularly bad over central and eastern Scotland, with widespread flooding. Yorkshire took a battering too, but thankfully I haven't heard of any floods in our local area. You can often judge how bad things are by where the river level in Roberts Park rises to. It's been known to flood right across the lower field, but this time it only spread over the footpath and had already receded by the time I went down to take these photos. You could see people were having to divert across the grass though, so the perimeter path must still have had some standing water.  The weir was rushing and foaming but, again, I've seen it worse. 

Fancy a paddle? No!

November has been a wetter than average month and a band of heavy rain moving slowly north-east overnight on 17/18th brought sufficient of a deluge to have an immediate impact on the river levels. It's the first time I've seen the weir in Roberts Park submerged for months. It got to the stage where it was 2/3rds dry over the summer. Looking the other way into Roberts Park, the river has refilled its course and covered over 'the beach' that had emerged. 

Beyond the park, the river current was strong - easier for the ducks but only as long as they want to travel the way it takes them! I always like this view. You'd never know it was in such a suburban area. 

The upper weir at Hirst Wood was fierce. You couldn't see any of the many rocks that litter this area. The original weir has got badly broken down over the years and the stones and rubble have been spread into a wide, rough cascade. 

I was intending to enjoy my usual walk along the river and back along the canal but then found my way impeded. There is a stream that runs down from Milner Field, beside the wood. It passes under a rough, low bridge - except that when I got there, it was passing both under and over the bridge! The photo isn't too clear but the water covers all of the foreground and was swirling about rather fast. I considered attempting to walk on the little parapet on the right but, even had I done so, there was a chasm a couple of feet wide at the far side, too big for me to leap and too deep and swirling for me to paddle through (in boots but not wellies). So I had to turn back; better safe than sorry. At least I was at the near end of the river bank path so I didn't have far to walk back. It's rather annoying though, because at some stage earlier in the year someone (not sure who - landowner? river management people?) spent ages digging out the channel of the stream above the little bridge and widening it, presumably to mitigate a perceived problem. End result is that the stream's flow, in mild flood, has been directed further over and obviously now chooses to bypass the bridge. Water will always take the most direct route! I must just remember for the future that if the river level is up to the top step by the rowing club, then I won't be able to negotiate the path further on. 

York's waterfront

York's riverside is, I find, visually a bit of a mishmash, with very old buildings like the early 17th century King's Arms pub rubbing shoulders with anodyne commercial premises and endless modern apartment buildings. 

 

Whenever we get flooding here in Saltaire, you can bet that a few days later the centre of York is inundated, since many of the rivers that arise in the Yorkshire Dales ultimately flow down to swell the River Ouse through York. Some of the buildings alongside the river flood regularly (sometimes up to four times a year!), so much so that they have well-rehearsed drills for dealing with the water, from tall flood barriers that slot in front of their doors and windows to specially tanked rooms with water-resistant plaster to moveable furniture and fittings. When I visited just one month after the latest deluge (see below for a press photo), you would not have known anything had happened, and all was up and running normally again. Remarkable. 

Slow the Flow

Landowners, various authorities and community groups have been doing a lot of work in Calderdale since the devastating floods of 2015 and 2020, to mitigate the potential for flooding. That extends to Hardcastle Crags, where the National Trust and 'Slow the Flow' volunteers are carrying out intensive woodland management efforts. There are areas of beech woods where the deep shade of the thick leaf canopy doesn't allow any scrub or plants to thrive. They are therefore reducing some of the trees to 'monoliths' by pruning the branches, to allow a greater variety of plants to grow underneath, which slows the flow of water across the land as well as increasing bio-diversity. The pruned branches are used to build 'leaky dams' like those in my photo above - upwards of 600 of them have now been laid throughout the estate. They are designed to slow the run-off of water by creating pools and allowing water to percolate through the barriers slowly. The science behind such schemes seems to be somewhat experimental but, considering the scale of the problems that we are having locally and the increase in violent weather, anything that mitigates even a little bit must surely be welcomed. It does sound as though the project is working quite effectively here at Hardcastle Crags. 

The post in my photo is a 'fixed point photography post'. The idea of this is to provide information over the seasons and in all weathers as to how the flood alleviation measures are working. Photographers are invited to stand at these points and take photos to submit to the National Trust as feedback on the conditions.  See HERE.

Read more about the overall project HERE. 

After the storms

We had a lull in the sequence of storms - wind, rain, snow and floods - that have plagued the UK over the past week or so. It's only temporary, I think, with more snow and wind on the way, but it has allowed the River Aire to sink back into its normal channel. Most of the flood water has receded too, apart from a rather large pool at one end of the park as you can see in the photo above. I think they may have to turn that into a lido swimming pool! It doesn't seem to be draining away very fast. 

The floodwater has moved downstream now to places like York and Tadcaster, which are badly affected. 

Elsewhere in the park there are signs of Spring. The crocuses look a bit battered but I'm sure they'll perk up in the sunshine. The river is still flowing fast and the weir looked lively. It hasn't dislodged the enormous tree trunk lying there though! That man from the Environment Agency will have to come back. 

 

Wellies and your big coat needed

I'm interrupting the Bankfield museum series in order to be topical - topic: the weather! 

Climate change is well and truly with us. We've had three named storms in the space of a few days, bringing gale force winds, heavy rain and snow, so it's not surprising that by Sunday our rivers were suffering under the impact. Mid-afternoon on Sunday, although it was still raining, I ventured down to the park to gauge what was happening. 

As you can see above, the river had breached and was pouring into Roberts Park. It hadn't (yet) topped the opposite bank but the Boathouse Inn had its flood defences in place. Further down by the bowling greens the car park was under water.  That huge, pesky tree (see HERE) was still trapped above the weir - one wonders for how much longer with that force of water... The weir itself was hard to see apart from the turbulence, though the river level was (at that time) not up to the top of the wall by Salts Mill.   

It's always a vulnerable spot further upstream by Hirst Weir and the Rowing Club (below), as Lode Pit Beck joins the Aire here. The banking by the weir is quite low and the whole area quickly gets inundated. You can just see the handrail of what is normally the footbridge over the beck. I suppose to an extent it is designed to be like that; allowing flooding on this side relieves the pressure against the old mill on the other bank, which is now residential property. 

The footpath through the nature reserve was awash - but this is designated flood plain and the houses above are elevated, hopefully high enough to be safe. 

The power of the water was terrifying, but the river level was still well below the footbridge across the Aire, where I stood to take the picture below.  

At the time I was exploring, the flooding wasn't as bad as the record floods of 2015, and was similar to those after Storm Ciara in 2020, but the rain was still falling and there was much more water to come down from the higher reaches of the river in the Dales. In the hour I was out, the water level in the park had come much higher, creeping up towards the Half Moon Café. 

Update - noon today

Although it is still raining and sleeting intermittently, I believe the worst of storm Christoph has passed. I took these photos at noon today, Thursday, some 24 hours after those I posted earlier. The river has risen further but is still bounded by the low wall in the park. The weirs are wild and furious, the new fish pass almost submerged. But the sky is lightening so I think we, in this area at least, have escaped serious flooding this time, as I believe has the Calder valley. It sounds worse over to the west around Manchester and North Wales. Floods are no fun at any time and especially in the middle of a pandemic so my heart goes out to anyone forced from their home or business. 

Teetering on the edge

After the snow came the snow-melt and the rain - Storm Christoph - and our rivers are under pressure. This was the scene at Hirst Weir yesterday afternoon (Wednesday). The river was just about holding the flow but it was still raining so it may have got worse later. The flats and houses around the old mill on the opposite bank appeared to be so far unscathed but, if I lived there, I'd have been watching and waiting with some trepidation. The water was right up to the decking. 

The little footbridge over Loadpit Beck (below), where the beck joins the River Aire, was just passable. (Normally the beck flows under it a good three feet below.) 

The level of the river in Roberts Park is my own 'measure'. On Tuesday it was just hitting the edge of the first strip of grass. By Wednesday, as you see below, it had progressed over the footpath, but there's then a low wall that bounds the cricket field and it hadn't yet reached the top of that. In the worst seasons, it can completely cover the field so there's a way to go yet before it reaches that level of awfulness. Let's hope it doesn't this time, as it only brings heartbreak to people lower down the valley, who then inevitably get flooded. 

The sensitive Calder valley, where my daughter lives, has so far escaped the worst of it too (as I write this on Wednesday night). So, although the rain is still coming down steadily, I pray the rainfall doesn't exceed the rivers' ability to sweep it away.