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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.
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Not an emergency service — if in danger call 999. Alerts rely on
EA/SEPA/NRW data and are best-efforts. Terms
Current Level
0.059 mASD
▬ Steady
24h Max
0.059 mASD
24h Min
0.059 mASD
Typical Range
0.02 - 0.13
mASD
Highest Recorded
0.30 mASD
EA official record
A 0.35 reading (1 Aug 1980) sits in our unverified raw history and is not treated as the record
Current level is 20% 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.
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.
Flow Data: Daily mean flow (m³/s) to 6 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 Trib Boathouse Creek · 5.4 km away in a straight line · discharges to the sea, an estuary or tidal water
0 spills · 0 hours in 2025
Not discharging now · last
1 other overflow within 6 km is downstream of this gauge or on another branch of the river network, so it is 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 0.13 m
on about 65 days.
This year so far: 0 days.
20260 days so far
20250 days
2024151 days, 47 of them high · 47 high
202353 days, 7 of them high · 7 high
20221 day
2021133 days, 43 of them high · 43 high
2020121 days
201915 days
2018110 days
20171 day
Counted from each day's highest reading. Days with missing or implausible readings are left out.
The darker part is days above 0.24 m, the level this gauge tops only a few days a year.
Flood history near this gauge
Official Environment Agency warnings issued since 2007 for the 10 flood
areas linked to this gauge (nearest 1.2 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 Heacham flood history.
Flood areas linked to this gauge
Flood warnings and alerts are issued for whole areas. These are the 10 areas linked to this gauge, nearest first.
🌊 Groundwater-fedSlow and steady — fed largely by groundwater, so levels change gradually, not in sudden spikes.
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
0.97
groundwater-fed — slow & steady
Avg Annual Rainfall
696 mm/yr
1991–2020 · +0% since 1941–70
Urban Extent
0.6%
largely rural
Median Annual Flood
0.442 m³/s
QMED — typical yearly peak flow
Highest Daily Mean Flow
1.09 m³/s
10 Jan 1994 · 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.
Two crump weirs gauging a predominantly Chalk catchment with agricultural land use, topographical catchment area substantially exceeds the true contributing area.
More detail
The catchment
Topographical catchment area substantially exceeds the true contributing area (by a factor of about two). Catchment area was determined in different ways. Area 55 sq. km is taken from the GA catchment area review of the Heacham/Wensum catchment boundary in 1996. This reduces the area from 59 sq. km, calculated in 1987, and from 89 sq. km adopted before 1987. The area of the NRFA catchment derived from IHDTM is 56 sq. km. Predominantly Chalk in parts overlain by Boulder Clay. Agricultural land use.
The station
Two Crump profile weirs in parallel, 3m broad in total.
How it measures flow
Weirs never drown. Small bypass channel with weir upstream of station, rejoining downstream of weir, is factored in to the stage-discharge relationship. One rating applied across period of record.
Flow regime
Groundwater abstraction for PWS and irrigation.
The flow record
Full period of record peak flow data reviewed and released in September 2020 (WINFAP Files v9).
How this gauging station is built and how long it has measured (NRFA / UKCEH).
Gauge type
Gauging structure
Operating since
1965
Station datum
9.4 mAOD
Flow record
1965–2024 · 59 yrs · 100% complete
Peak-flow record
since 1965
Hydrometric area
33
Measured by
Environment Agency
Nearby Groundwater
Soil Moisture
Possible storm-overflow correlation
Frequently asked questions
Is the Heacham River at Heacham flooding today?
The current level is 0.06m, which is within the typical range of 0.02 to 0.13m. Flooding is unlikely at this level.
Is the river level rising or falling at Heacham?
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 Heacham River at Heacham?
The typical range at this station is 0.02m to 0.13m, based on Environment Agency historical data. Levels above 0.13m 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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