Brightlingsea Station Road CSO

Storm overflow run by Anglian Water, discharging into The West Dyke.

Storm overflow on the sewer network Bathing water Shellfish water Harwich and North Essex constituency

Linked bathing water: Brightlingsea, classified Excellent for 2025. Named in the company’s return to the Environment Agency. A name opens that bathing water’s official profile, with any pollution warning in the season. The classification is the Environment Agency’s for that bathing season, from all its samples there: it is not a reading of the water today, and it does not say what part this overflow played.

Right now
Not discharging
Last discharge ended on (43 days ago).
Times are UK time. Company feed updated 3 min ago

"Not discharging" means the company's monitor reports no discharge right now — not that the water is clean. The feed publishes status only; no discharge volume is measured.

2026 so far
7spills
1.8 h discharging on 7 days · counted by us, not yet official
2025 official
20spills
5.7 h · −39% on 2024
Rank in Anglian Water
#270
of 1,428 overflows by 2025 spills (1 = most)
Monitor in 2025
99.9% working
Long-term average 63.9 spills a year

Year by year

The Environment Agency's official annual returns, counted the EA's way (12/24-hour spills). 2026 is our own running count, the same way, from Anglian Water's monitor log and the live feed. The official figure is published next spring.

2021
16 spills · 13 hmonitor 100%
2022
12 spills · 3.1 hmonitor 78.6%
2023
25 spills · 14 hmonitor 98.2%
2024
33 spills · 9.8 hmonitor 100%
2025
20 spills · 5.7 hmonitor 99.9%
2026so far
7 spills · 1.8 h

A spill is the EA's 12/24-hour count: the first 12 hours of a discharge count as one, each further 24 hours with discharge as one more. "Monitor" is the share of that year the monitor was working, so a 0 beside a working monitor is a real zero; "no data" means the monitor produced no usable data that year — not zero. Years before 2024 are matched to this site by name and location, because the EA's site IDs changed that year; a monitor figure beside one of them means the outlet's permit confirms the match.

Other outlets here

Anglian Water runs 5 other overflows within 300 m that also discharge into The West Dyke. They share the sewer and the storm, so one outlet's figures are only part of what reaches the water.

0m Brightlingsea - Spring Road CSOAWS00142Brightlingsea - Spring Road Combined Sewer Overflow 15spills in 2025
0m Brightlingsea CSO (Bellfield 35)AWS00143Brightlingsea Overflow (Bellfld 35) 16spills in 2025
0m Brightlingsea Station Road CSOAWS00145Brightlingsea Station Road Combined Sewer Overflow 15spills in 2025
0m Brightlingsea Station Road CSOAWS00146Brightlingsea Overflow (Western Road) Community Centre 2spills in 2025
10m Brightlingsea West Dyke Terminal PSAWS00147Brightlingsea West Dyke Terminal Pumping Station 8spills in 2025

This overflow (Brightlingsea Overflow Lower Park Road): 20 spills in 2025. Distances are between the published outlet points. The names in brackets are Anglian Water's own, from its return.

What the 2025 return says

From Anglian Water's annual return to the Environment Agency for this overflow.

High-spill review
High spill threshold not met
Long-term review
Data collection - EDM non-representative location
Investigation
Bathing Water and/or Shellfish Water investigation ongoing
Improvement work
Env Act (SODRP) improvement ongoing, UWWTR improvement ongoing
Monitored since
2019
Water body
Colne Essex

"High spill threshold not met" means this overflow did not spill often enough to trigger the EA's formal high-spill review for that year. It is not a statement that the spills were harmless.

Discharges we have recorded

115 discharge periods since 2 Jan 2024. 114 of them come from Anglian Water's own event-duration-monitoring records (published on Stream, Jan 2024 – Jun 2026); the live feed adds anything after that. The official annual count is the figure to quote.

Show 30 earlier (of 115)
StartedEndedDischarge time
14 min
8 min
2 min
2 min
2 min
2 min
14 min
8 min
2 min
2 min
2 min
6 min
18 min
14 min
2 min
2 min
6 min
14 min
12 min
10 min
4 min
2 min
4 min
10 min
4 min
2 min
4 min
2 min
4 min
4 min

The year figures above use the EA's 12/24-hour counting method, so they are comparable with the official figures; the monitor log's 138 raw blocks were merged into 115 continuous discharge periods (gaps under 15 min joined).

What the feed showed

FloodRadar's own record of every change of state Anglian Water's live feed has shown for this overflow, kept since : 1 state. The feed publishes its status now and its latest discharge, nothing older; the discharges above are read from this. It is here so the figures can be checked.

Show the last 1 states
SeenStatusSinceLatest discharge
Not discharging →

Rain nearby last 30 days

Nearest live rain gauge: Rainfall gauge nr Brightlingsea, 1.5 km away. Brown shading = when this overflow was discharging; ▼ = a discharge start.

Overflow shading is a timing match, not proof of cause — heavy rain and spills share a trigger. Times come from the water company’s event-duration monitor (site status only; no discharge volume is published).

Where it is

Nearest river gauge
Colne Barrier (Essex Coast) · 6.1 km
Nearest rain gauge
Council area
Tendring District
Anglian Water's own name for it
Brightlingsea Overflow Lower Park Road
Site reference
AWS00144 · permit ASENF3270/12162
Coordinates
51.80959, 1.01768

Tell me when this overflow discharges

One message when the company's monitor reports a new discharge here. At most one every 6 hours.

Setting this alert needs JavaScript. The alerts you already have are on your alerts page.

The alert repeats the monitor's status: whether the overflow is discharging, not how much or why. It can only tell you about a discharge that starts after you turn it on.

Concerned about this overflow?

Report pollution you can see or smell to the regulator straight away; the company handles complaints about the overflow itself.

Write to the MP

The Environment Agency's return places this overflow in the Harwich and North Essex constituency. An MP can ask the company and the regulator questions on a constituent's behalf. These words carry the official figures; change them as you like.

The link opens Parliament's own "Find your MP", which gives the MP's name and how to write to them. FloodRadar sends nothing and keeps nothing you write. Check the constituency against your own address: an MP acts only for people who live in it.

Live status: © Anglian Water storm overflow activity data, licensed under CC BY 4.0. Annual spill figures: Environment Agency Event Duration Monitoring return, © Environment Agency copyright and/or database right, Open Government Licence (OGL) v3.0. Storm-overflow spill events: © the respective water company, published on Stream (data.streamwaterdata.co.uk) under CC BY 4.0. Discharges marked "EA start/stop data": Environment Agency Event Duration Monitoring storm overflow start/stop detailed data, © Environment Agency copyright and/or database right 2026, Open Government Licence v3.0; the companies' monitor records as the EA received them, not verified by the EA. Discharges marked "via Top of the Poops", come from Top of the Poops' record of the same company feed, used under CC BY-SA 4.0: the feed's own start and end times as its pages print them, not their derived hours. Times are shown in UK local time. FloodRadar republishes the monitor's status and the EA's figures; it does not measure discharges itself. Constituency and council area from the EA's return: contains OS data © Crown copyright and database right 2026.