After a long dry spell the heavens have opened over South West England once again. Here is this evening’s WaterFit Live map from South West Water:
In our corner of Devon there have been multi-hour CSO activations at Woolacombe, Ilfracombe and Lynmouth, plus our nearest surfing beach at Widemouth Bay in North Cornwall:
The Environment Agency has issued red flood warnings for the lower River Torridge and the middle River Taw:
Yellow flood alerts have also been issued for the upper and middle River Tamar and the rest of the Taw and Torridge catchments. Needless to say the WaterFit Live map is full of yellow warnings for sewage pollution:
The Environment Agency has issued an “Advice against bathing” warning, due to sewage pollution at Dittisham on the estuary of the River Dart:
This morning the flood warnings and alerts remain in place, and the water level in the River Torridge is rising again:
It will not come as a surprise to learn that there is no respite in the sewage pollution around the coasts of Devon and Cornwall:
To add insult to considerable injury, the Environment Agency has issued another “Advice against bathing” warning, due to sewage pollution at Plymouth Hoe West:
The EA’s warning for Dittisham remains in place.
[Update – January 7th]The Environment Agency flood and sewage pollution warnings have been removed today, but there are still plenty of active Combined Sewer Overflows around our coasts:
In North Devon there are continuing multi-day “spills” at Woolacombe, Ilfracombe and Combe Martin:
Moving further west along the coast into North Cornwall, there are also ongoing multi-day sewage pollution incidents at Trebarwith Strand, Trevone, Harlyn and Mawgan Porth:
Further west still there are also ongoing multi-day sewage spills affecting Portreath on the north coast, and Falmouth, Pentewan, Par Sands, East Looe and Seaton on the south coast of Cornwall:
Across the River Tamar along the south coast of Devon the lengthening list of multi-day sewage pollution incidents includes several affecting the River Plym and Plymouth Hoe, and also the River Erme and hence Mothecombe and Coastguard beaches. Rounding Start Point there are also ongoing multi-day “spills” affecting Meadfoot Beach in Torbay, Sandy Bay near Exmouth, Sidmouth and the River Axe at Seaton:
Yesterday North Cornwall MP Ben Maguire published an “open letter” addressed to Susan Davy, the Chief Executive of South West Water:
🚨🚨 SOUTH WEST WATER: ENOUGH IS ENOUGH. ⏳
— Ben Maguire MP for North Cornwall (@BenMaguireNC) January 7, 2025
I have today demanded that Susan Davy, the Chief Exec of South West Water, resign from her position with immediate effect.
South West Water’s failures have reached an intolerable level under her leadership over the past decade.… pic.twitter.com/1MoKPsc6ch
South West Water have not announced Ms. Davy’s resignation yet, but their web site still shows “an intolerable level” of recent sewage pollution incidents:
Many CSOs that first activated on January 4th are still operating this morning, including those at Harlyn Bay, Pentewan, Par Sands, Efford Marsh in Plymouth and Meadfoot Beach. Also a new “spill” has appeared on the WaterFit Live map, at Porthcurno in the far west of Cornwall:
Not obvious from this morning’s map is another long lasting pollution event at Sandy Bay near Exmouth. The map shows a CSO activation lasting less than an hour in the small hours of this morning. However the data acquired by our “Combined Sewer Overflow Monitor” project shows that with brief gaps yesterday the pollution at Sandy Bay actually started on January 4th.
P.S. By mid afternoon snow has started falling across much of South West England:
Several more of the “usual suspect” beaches are now affected by active CSOs:
They include Exmouth, Long Rock beach in Penzance and Sidmouth once again:
P.P.S. Tonight still more yellow warnings have appeared, including Sandy Bay once again:
It may not yet be obvious from this morning’s WaterFit Live map, but there has been a reduction in the number of active CSOs overnight:
However several multi-day sewage pollution events are continuing, including those that started on January 4th in Plymouth, Pentewan, Harlyn Bay, Par Sands and Meadfoot beach:
Then there are the ongoing “spills” that started on January 5th, including at Woolacombe in North Devon and Mothecombe and Coastguard beaches on the south coast. The latter two are both currently affected by sewage entering the River Erme at Ivybridge and Ermington.
Other ongoing multi-day spills include Falmouth which started on January 6th, and Porthcurno on the 8th:
According to George Thorpe of BBC News on January 5th:
Work to replace more than 300m (984ft) of sewer has been completed as part of a multi-million pound project in Devon.
South West Water (SWW) said engineers carried out the work on the sewer entering the Maer Lane wastewater treatment site in Exmouth over eight weeks.
Here are this evening’s updates from South West Water’s WaterFit Live map for Exmouth and nearby Sandy Bay:
Those brief “spills” don’t look too concerning at first sight. However, data from our “Combined Sewer Overflow Monitor” project shows that pollution from CSOs has been affecting the beaches at both Exmouth and Sandy Bay for most of the time since January 4th:
The number of yellow warnings on the WaterFit Live map has reduced again this morning, particularly along the north coast:
However the “spill” at Harlyn Bay that started on January 4th is continuing this morning. So are the south coast CSO activations affecting Plymouth from the 4th and Mothecombe from the 5th:
The number of CSO activation warnings on the WaterFit Live map continues to decrease:
However, the multi-day “spills” at Harlyn Bay and Pentewan from January 4th, and at Mothecombe from Jan 5th, continue for yet another day:
The continuous CSO activations affecting Plymouth, Meadfoot Beach and Par Sands that began on January 4th have recently come to an end. However, that is not obvious for the latter two from the current information available via South West Water’s map:
Our “Combined Sewer Overflow Monitor” data reveals the full facts about the series of recent activations of the three Combined Sewer Overflows:
This morning only 6 yellow warnings remain on the WaterFit Live map:
However, the sewage “spills” at Portreath, Seaton, Mothecombe and Pentewan continue:
This afternoon the Environment Agency has issued an “Advice against bathing” warning, due to sewage pollution at Stoke Gabriel:
The WaterFit Live map is still not clear of sewage pollution warnings:
One of them refers to a CSO activation in Stoke Gabriel.
The heavy rain accompanying the arrival of Storm Éowyn isn’t due to arrive until late tonight. Nevertheless some rain this morning has caused sewage pollution incidents all around the coast of Devon and Cornwall:
Amongst many others there are ongoing CSO activations at our local surfing beach at Widemouth Bay, as well as at two of the usual suspects on the south coast of Devon at Plymouth and Exmouth:
South West England hasn’t suffered as badly as Ireland and areas of the UK further north from Storm Éowyn. However we have had plenty of wind and rain. Consequently this morning’s WaterFit Live map contains many more yellow sewage pollution warnings.
In particular there are ongoing CSO activations on the south coast of Cornwall at Par Sands and Falmouth:
They finished earlier today, but on the south coast of Devon there have been CSO activations lasting over 24 hours at Exmouth, Sidmouth and Seaton:
In the wake of Storm Éowyn there’s been plenty more wind and rain overnight. This morning’s WaterFit Live map is a sea of yellow once again:
In North Cornwall there are ongoing CSO activations at Widemouth Bay, Harlyn and Mawgan Porth:
Along the south coast of Devon there are ongoing CSO activations at many of the “usual suspects”, including Plymouth, Exmouth, Sandy Bay, Sidmouth and Seaton.
Thanks to Storm Herminia there’s been plenty more wind and rain overnight. Consequently South West Water’s WaterFit Live map is now covered with even more sewage pollution warnings:
There are now numerous ongoing multi-day CSO activations, including those at Harlyn, Pentewan, Par Sands, Exmouth and Sidmouth:
This morning the WaterFit Live map for Plymouth Hoe East shows that the current activation of the Forder Valley CSO started at 18:16 yesterday evening. While that information is correct as far as it goes, the data acquired by our “Combined Sewer Overflow Monitor” project shows that with brief gaps yesterday the pollution incident actually started at 9:04 in the morning:
Similarly the WaterFit Live map for Seaton in East Devon shows that the current activation at the Seaton South sewage treatment works started at 23:40 last night. Our CSO monitor data shows that apart from (very!) brief gaps the flow of sewage into the River Axe started at 1:47 yesterday morning, following another multi-day “spill” on January 24th/25th:
The rain has continued overnight, so there are still plenty of sewage pollution warnings on the WaterFit Live map this morning:
In our corner of the country there have been further brief “spills” at Widemouth Bay and Westward Ho!
The multi-day CSO activations at Harlyn, Plymouth, Exmouth and Sidmouth have continued for another day.
Yesterday evening the Environment Agency issued an “Advice against bathing” warning due to a “pollution incident” at Sugary Cove near Dartmouth. By way of a change, on this occasion it is due to “pollution from oil or fuel”:
To be continued…
