UK flood report: Storm Christoph

This report covers the winter storm Christoph in the UK. The storm produced a convective rainstorm which brought severe flooding to the United Kingdom. The peak of the flooding emergency occurred around 21st January but the impacts of the storm were felt until the 26th. Ambiental was actively monitoring Storm Christoph and conducted a review of the properties and postcodes which fell within the flood warning areas.

The analysis calculates the number of properties within warning areas by postcode and predicted which properties were likely to be flooded based on spatial analysis of our UK FloodScore™ database. During the event, they monitored media reports and river levels. In the immediate aftermath, they commissioned a post-event review where the team of flood analysts collated information and analytics on the event. Ambiental supported the clients with data and analysis and performed successful verifications of the flood hazard map predictions against the recorded instances of flooding.

By comparing the models to Storm Christoph they are able to determine the predictive accuracy of our high precision UK FloodMap product. As Storm Christoph approached over 300 flood alerts were issued by the Environment Agency in the three days leading up to the storm hitting. The impact of Storm Christoph was widespread, with 675 properties flooded across England and Wales. A major incident was declared in South Yorkshire as Storm Christoph brought more torrential rain and flooding to the area already badly hit by Storm Bella in late December 2020.