Killhope Burn
Joins the Wear above Stanhope, its highest gauge, no more than 14.3 km by river above Stanhope.
| Wearhead | 0.15 m 1h ago | Normal |
Its water passes every gauge on the Wear, from Stanhope down.
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Live levels from 5 monitoring stations across County Durham, updated every 15 minutes.
| Station | Level now | Status | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Stanhope | 0.30 m 1h ago | Normal | ||
| 25.6 km by river | ||||
| Witton Park | 0.40 m 1h ago | Normal | ||
| 20.5 km by river | ||||
| Sunderland Bridge | 0.28 m 1h ago | Normal | ||
| 9.6 km by river | ||||
| Durham New Elvet Bridge | 0.23 m 1h ago | Normal | ||
| 20.5 km by river | ||||
| Chester-Le-Street | 0.32 m 1h ago | Normal | ||
Stations are listed from source to mouth as the water flows, traced on the river map (OS Open Rivers) and the Environment Agency’s own links between its gauges. A distance “by river” is along the river, and is shown only where the map traces the path.
Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database rights 2026.
Streams and rivers with a gauge whose water joins the Wear above one of its gauges, from the source down. Named streams without a gauge that have a page here are listed at the end.
Joins the Wear above Stanhope, its highest gauge, no more than 14.3 km by river above Stanhope.
| Wearhead | 0.15 m 1h ago | Normal |
Its water passes every gauge on the Wear, from Stanhope down.
Joins the Wear above Stanhope, its highest gauge, no more than 3.9 km by river above Stanhope.
| Eastgate | 0.06 m 1h ago | Normal |
Its water passes every gauge on the Wear, from Stanhope down.
Joins the Wear between Stanhope and Witton Park, no more than 7.9 km by river above Witton Park.
| Bedburn | 0.13 m 1h ago | Normal |
Its water passes Witton Park and every gauge below it on the Wear. It does not pass Stanhope or the gauges above it.
Joins the Wear between Witton Park and Sunderland Bridge, no more than 25.9 km by river above Sunderland Bridge.
| Crook West Bridge Street | 0.00 m 1h ago | Low |
Its water passes Sunderland Bridge and every gauge below it on the Wear. It does not pass Witton Park or the gauges above it.
Joins the Wear between Witton Park and Sunderland Bridge, no more than 18.3 km by river above Sunderland Bridge.
| Copley | 0.07 m 7h ago | Normal |
| 6.6 km by river | ||
| Lowlands | 0.07 m 1h ago | Normal |
| 3.0 km by river | ||
| Ramshaw Mill | 0.06 m 1h ago | Low |
| 1.7 km by river | ||
| Spring Gardens Damstructure | 0.50 m 1h ago | Normal |
| 1.8 km by river | ||
| West Auckland | 0.14 m 1h ago | Normal |
| 7.0 km by river | ||
| Dovecote Hill | 0.48 m 1h ago | Normal |
| 1.2 km by river | ||
| South Church | 0.06 m 1h ago | Low |
Its water passes Sunderland Bridge and every gauge below it on the Wear. It does not pass Witton Park or the gauges above it.
Joins the Wear between Sunderland Bridge and Durham New Elvet Bridge, no more than 11.2 km by river above Durham New Elvet Bridge.
| Burn Hall | 0.10 m 1h ago | Normal |
Its water passes Durham New Elvet Bridge and every gauge below it on the Wear. It does not pass Sunderland Bridge or the gauges above it.
No gauge below Chester-Le-Street is known on the river map.
Tributaries and where they join are traced on the river map (OS Open Rivers, edition 2026-04) and the Environment Agency’s links between its gauges. The map holds distances between gauges, not the junctions themselves, so a junction is placed between two gauges, and no further up than the tributary’s own lowest gauge. Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database rights 2026.
189 storm overflows are traced upstream of Chester-Le-Street, the Wear’s lowest gauge on the river map: on the Wear itself, on its gauged tributaries, and on smaller streams that join above there.
Official figures for 2025, for the overflows traced upstream of Chester-Le-Street: 3,943 spills over 20,910 hours in total, across the 187 that have a figure. 2 have no 2025 figure.
Each overflow is listed in the stretch above the first gauge its water reaches, from the source down, as on the Gauges tab. A stretch of the Wear includes the smaller streams that join it there. Where a stretch or a tributary has more than 4, the 3 discharging now or nearest its gauge are listed, the rest are counted, and every one is in that gauge’s “Upstream of here” list. Show every overflow in every stretch →
and 2 more: show all 5 overflows on this stretch → All above Stanhope, nearest first →
and 9 more: show all 12 overflows on this stretch → All above Witton Park, nearest first →
and 40 more: show all 43 overflows on this stretch → All above Sunderland Bridge, nearest first →
and 17 more: show all 20 overflows on the Gaunless and the streams that join it → All above South Church, nearest first →
and 37 more: show all 40 overflows on this stretch → All above Durham New Elvet Bridge, nearest first →
and 34 more: show all 37 overflows on the Browney and the streams that join it → All above Burn Hall, nearest first →
and 26 more: show all 29 overflows on this stretch → All above Chester-Le-Street, nearest first →
Within 3 km of one of the Wear’s gauges in a straight line, but the river map cannot say whether their water reaches it.
21 more near these gauges whose connection is not known.
16 other overflows within 3 km of these gauges are placed below the Wear’s lowest gauge or on another river, so not listed.
A status is the water company’s own monitor: it says whether an overflow is discharging, never how much or why, and a spill does not by itself explain a change in a river level. A status older than two hours is shown as unknown. Annual figures are the official returns: 12/24-hour spills for England and Wales, overflow events for Scotland (Scottish Water counts differently, so the two cannot be compared). “No data” means the monitor produced no usable data that year, not zero. Overflows are placed on OS Open Rivers (edition 2026-04), which leaves out many small channels: an overflow the map cannot place may still drain here. Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database rights 2026. Sewage in Britain’s rivers →
Live status: © Northumbrian Water storm overflow activity data, licensed under CC BY 4.0. Annual figures for England: Environment Agency Event Duration Monitoring return, © Environment Agency copyright and/or database right, Open Government Licence v3.0.
Dated samples taken by the Environment Agency, not live readings. Results are published days to months after the sample is taken, and many points are sampled only a few times a year, or have not been sampled for years.
179 sampling points on the River Wear and the streams that join it above Chester-Le-Street, and below it. 34 have a sample from the last 12 months; 93 have any sample banked.
Sampled most recently, anywhere on the Wear and its streams:
| Where, from the source down | Sampling points | Newest sample |
|---|---|---|
| Above WearheadKillhope Burn · joins the Wear above Stanhope | 6 points3 sampled | 20 May 2026 |
| Above EastgateRookhope Burn · joins the Wear above Stanhope | 11 points6 sampled | 18 Dec 2023 |
| Above Stanhope | 31 points16 sampled | 3 Sep 2026 |
| River Gaunless and its streamsjoins the Wear above Sunderland Bridge | 14 points6 sampled | 20 Aug 2026 |
| Above BedburnBedburn Beck · joins the Wear above Witton Park | 15 points12 sampled | 3 Sep 2026 |
| Above Crook West Bridge StreetCrook Beck · joins the Wear above Sunderland Bridge | 1 point0 sampled | none banked |
| River Browney and its streamsjoins the Wear above Durham New Elvet Bridge | 20 points9 sampled | 6 Aug 2026 |
| Above Witton Park | 30 points20 sampled | 3 Sep 2026 |
| Above Sunderland Bridge | 18 points4 sampled | 3 Sep 2026 |
| Above Durham New Elvet Bridge | 17 points9 sampled | 3 Sep 2026 |
| Above Chester-Le-Street | 14 points6 sampled | 3 Sep 2026 |
| Below the lowest gauge | 2 points | 11 Aug 2026 |
England's samples only. Each count opens the list of those points, nearest first, with the date of each one’s latest sample (the gauge’s “Upstream of here” list).
FloodRadar does not grade these results: there is no overall score, and official river classifications are a separate dataset. A sample taken downstream of an overflow does not by itself show where anything in it came from. River connections and distances are traced on OS Open Rivers (edition 2026-04), which leaves out many small channels.
Water samples: Environment Agency Water Quality Archive, © Environment Agency and/or database right 2026, Open Government Licence v3.0.
Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database rights 2026.
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