Upper and Bedford Ouse catchment
• Leighton Buzzard • Central Bedfordshire • ID: E21987 • Level
(23m ago) • 4 readings/hr • 104 views
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⤴Unusual rise — FloodRadar+Top 1% rise rate for this gauge.
Height for "Above a height"
Drag the line on the chart, or type a value:mASD
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You'll be notified when this gauge is rising more than 0.10 m/hr — a sign of rapidly increasing water levels.
You'll be notified when a new storm-overflow (sewage) discharge starts within ~3 km of this gauge, based on the water companies' near-real-time feeds.
Get notified when recent rainfall near this gauge crosses its learnt rise trigger — an early "watch"
signal, typically hours before a rise. Experimental; not an official flood warning.
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Current Level
0.054 mASD
▬ Steady
24h Max
0.056 mASD
24h Min
0.041 mASD
Typical Range
0.02 - 1.47
mASD
Highest Recorded
2.71 mASD
EA official record
2.71 in our data (since Dec 2002)
Current level is 2% of this
🚽Sewage overflows nearby
Recent Water Levels
🌍 floodradar.co.uk
1 day
EA forecast (official)
Prediction V2
Prediction Eris
Nimbus beta
Experimental model fusing soil moisture, river flow, groundwater and catchment
character. The shaded band is its 10–90% range, widened so that about 80% of recent outcomes fall inside it.
Under evaluation — not yet promoted, so treat as a second opinion. The nearest rain gauge has sent no readings in the last day, so Nimbus has no recent measured rain to work from here.
River Flow
90 days
Daily mean discharge (m³/s) with the daily min–max band, from the EA Hydrology API. Flow is the volume of water passing the gauge — often a more direct flood signal than level.
CLIPSTONE BROOK GS LEIGHTON BUZZARD WITS DO NOT POLL MANUALLY (E22300) — flow at this site
7 days
A separate gauge 0 m from this one at the same site, shown here for context.
Its readings are its own and are never merged with this page's.
CLIPSTONE BROOK GS LEIGHTON BUZZARD WITS DO NOT POLL MANUALLY (E22561) — flow at this site
7 days
A separate gauge 0 m from this one at the same site, shown here for context.
Its readings are its own and are never merged with this page's.
Flow Data: Daily mean flow (m³/s) to 8 Oct (2 days behind — the EA publishes each day's mean a day or two after it ends; unchecked, provisional)via EA Hydrology
None of the storm overflows FloodRadar holds is traced upstream of this gauge on the mapped river network. That is not the same as none: the map leaves out many small streams and culverts, so an overflow it cannot place may still drain here, and not every company publishes every overflow. Those nearby are listed below.
Nearby, connection not known
Within 6 km in a straight line, but the river map cannot say whether their water passes this gauge.
Anglian Water · into Tributary Of The River Ouzel · 5.8 km away in a straight line · its watercourse is not on the river map
13 spills · 64 hours in 2025
Not discharging now · last
5 other overflows within 6 km are downstream of this gauge or on another branch of the river network, so they are not listed.
These are the water companies' monitor statuses; a spill does not by itself explain a change in the gauge level. River connections and distances are traced on OS Open Rivers (edition 2026-04), which leaves out many small channels. Explore the sewage map →
In a typical year this gauge reaches its typical high of 1.47 m
on about 1 day.
This year so far: 1 day.
20261 day so far
20250 days
20246 days
20230 days
20220 days
20212 days patchy data
20201 day
20190 days
20180 days
20170 days
Counted from each day's highest reading. Days with missing or implausible readings are left out, so a year marked patchy may have run high more often than shown.
Flood history near this gauge
Official Environment Agency warnings issued since 2019 for the 5 flood
areas linked to this gauge (nearest 0.5 km away).
Warnings apply to a whole flood area, not necessarily this exact spot. Years before 2006 aren't covered by the EA's historic record.
See also the Leighton Buzzard flood history.
Flood areas linked to this gauge
Flood warnings and alerts are issued for whole areas. These are the 5 areas linked to this gauge, nearest first.
🌊 Fairly flashyResponds fairly quickly to rain, with moderate baseflow between events.
Your catchment is all the land that drains rainfall into the river above this gauge. Its character — how
steep, wet, wooded, urban or chalky that land is — decides how fast rain here turns into a rising river. A steep, bare or clay
catchment is “flashy” (rises and falls quickly, floods easily); a flat, chalk or well-wooded one is
slow and steady. The tiles below put numbers to that; the flow-duration curve reads left-to-right
from the river’s typical high flows (Q5) down to its low flows (Q95) — a steep curve means a flashy river.
The physical character of the land that drains to this gauge, and how it shapes its flood response — from the National River Flow Archive (UKCEH).
Baseflow Index
0.37
mixed response
Avg Annual Rainfall
659 mm/yr
1991–2020 · +1% since 1941–70
Urban Extent
1.2%
largely rural
Median Annual Flood
9.06 m³/s
QMED — typical yearly peak flow
Highest Daily Mean Flow
13.25 m³/s
23 Sep 2024 · daily mean, not the instantaneous peak
Flow-Duration Curve
Daily flow (m³/s) exceeded each % of the time — a steep curve is flashy, a flat one is steady. Q5 high · Q50 median · Q95 low.
A triangular Flat V weir gauging a predominantly rural, Greensand catchment with some artificial influences. Multiple structures in operation during POR.
More detail
The catchment
Greensand catchment, tributary to the river Ouzel. Predominantly rural, minor urban development (Leighton Buzzard).
The station
A triangular Flat V weir installed in 2002, 1km u/s of the previous structures: Crump weir (1966-1980) broad-crested weir (1957-1962).
How it measures flow
Current daily flow rating considers drowning although there are limited gaugings to confirm rating. Two peak flow ratings applied across period of record, the most recent is valid from Oct 2002 when the new weir was constructed.
Flow regime
Runoff influenced by groundwater abstraction/recharge. Runoff reduced by industrial/agricultural abstraction. Runoff augmented by effluent returns.
The flow record
Peak flow data are only presented for the current structure (01/10/2006 onwards). Gap in record when station not operational (1980-2002). Full period of record peak flow data reviewed and released in September 2023 (WINFAP Files v12).
Timing, not cause. Gauges can move together simply because the same rain fell on both.
Frequently asked questions
Is the Clipstone Brook at Clipstone Brook flooding today?
The current level is 0.05m, which is within the typical range of 0.02 to 1.47m. Flooding is unlikely at this level.
Is the river level rising or falling at Clipstone Brook?
Based on the most recent readings, the level is currently steady. The chart above shows the last 12 hours of measurements by default (up to 7 days), updated roughly every 15 minutes.
What is a normal level for the Clipstone Brook at Clipstone Brook?
The typical range at this station is 0.02m to 1.47m, based on Environment Agency historical data. Levels above 1.47m are higher than usually seen and may indicate a flood risk.
How often is this river level data updated?
Readings are supplied by the Environment Agency gauge. FloodRadar checks for updates roughly every 15 minutes; the timestamp above shows how recent the latest available reading is.
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📮 Flood risk by postcode near this gauge
Postcodes within 5 km with properties in the Environment Agency’s rivers-and-sea flood-risk bands:
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