Porlock Combined Sewer Overflow

Storm overflow run by Wessex Water, discharging into Hawkcombe Stream.

Storm overflow on the sewer network Bathing water Tiverton and Minehead constituency

Linked bathing water: Porlock Weir, 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 (17 days ago).
Times are UK time. Company feed updated 2 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
12spills
1.8 h discharging on 12 days · counted by us, not yet official
2025 official
13spills
2.1 h · −28% on 2024
Rank in Wessex Water
#597
of 1,285 overflows by 2025 spills (1 = most)
Monitor in 2025
100% working
Long-term average 13.6 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 Wessex Water's monitor log and the live feed. The official figure is published next spring.

2021
16 spills · 2.5 hmonitor 99.2%
2022
1 spill · 0 hmonitor 16.1%
2023
22 spills · 3.7 hmonitor 99.5%
2024
18 spills · 3.9 hmonitor 99.6%
2025
13 spills · 2.1 hmonitor 100%
2026so far
12 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.

What the 2025 return says

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

High-spill review
High spill threshold not met
Long-term review
Performance - SW Infiltration
Investigation
Env Act (SODRP) investigation ongoing, UWWTR investigation ongoing
Improvement work
Operational improvement completed
Monitored since
2019
Water body
Hawcombe STR

"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

31 discharge periods since 24 Jan 2025. 25 of them come from Wessex Water's own event-duration-monitoring records (published on Stream, Jan 2025 – Aug 2026); the live feed adds anything after that. The official annual count is the figure to quote.

Show 21 earlier
StartedEndedDischarge time
2 min
2 min
2 min
2 min
2 min
16 min
18 min
8 min
2 min
2 min
2 min
4 min
8 min
8 min
6 min
24 min
6 min
4 min
4 min
10 min
2 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 50 raw blocks were merged into 31 continuous discharge periods (gaps under 15 min joined).

What the feed showed

FloodRadar's own record of every change of state Wessex 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 Luccombe, 2.6 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
Parsons Street (Hawkcombe Stream) · 1.0 km
Nearest rain gauge
Council area
Somerset
Wessex Water's own name for it
Porlock So
Site reference
WXW00871 · permit 100354
Coordinates
51.21561, -3.59999

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 Tiverton and Minehead 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: © Wessex 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 "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.