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Current Level
0.231 m
▬ Steady
24h Max
0.259 m
24h Min
0.198 m
Typical Range
0.21 - 2.50
m
Highest Recorded
3.91 m
16 Mar 2013
Since Jan 1977
Current level is 6% of this
🚽Sewage overflows nearby
Recent Water Levels
🌍 floodradar.co.uk
1 day
Prediction V2
Prediction Eris
Nimbus beta
Experimental model fusing soil moisture, river flow, groundwater and catchment
character. Shown with its calibrated 10–90% confidence band. 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.
Long Term
🌍 floodradar.co.uk
—
Consecutive rainy days0 → 10+
Days Above Normal
This year vs 5-year monthly range
Recent Readings
Falling · -0.9 cm over 6h
24 Aug 00:00▬ steady0.231 m
23 Aug 23:45▲ +0.1 cm0.231 m
23 Aug 23:30▬ steady0.230 m
23 Aug 23:15▲ +0.1 cm0.230 m
23 Aug 23:00▬ steady0.229 m
23 Aug 22:45▲ +0.2 cm0.229 m
23 Aug 21:30▬ steady0.227 m
23 Aug 21:15▼ -0.1 cm0.227 m
23 Aug 21:00▬ steady0.228 m
23 Aug 20:45▬ steady0.228 m
23 Aug 20:30▼ -0.1 cm0.228 m
23 Aug 20:15▼ -0.1 cm0.229 m
23 Aug 20:00▼ -0.2 cm0.230 m
23 Aug 19:45▼ -0.2 cm0.232 m
23 Aug 19:30▬ steady0.234 m
23 Aug 19:15▼ -0.2 cm0.235 m
23 Aug 19:00▼ -0.1 cm0.237 m
23 Aug 18:45▼ -0.1 cm0.238 m
23 Aug 18:30▼ -0.1 cm0.239 m
23 Aug 18:150.240 m
Rainfall & Weather
Loading rainfall and weather data...
Flood history near this gauge
Official Environment Agency warnings issued since 2008 for the 27 flood
areas linked to this gauge (nearest 1.1 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 Warrington flood history.
Geographic coordinates may reflect the access point for the gauge, and not the precise location in the watercourse that it is taking readings from.
Catchment Character
🌊 Urban & flashyHeavily built-up — rain runs off hard surfaces fast, so levels can spike within hours of heavy rain.
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
0.47
mixed response
Avg Annual Rainfall
931 mm/yr
1991–2020 · +3% since 1941–70
Urban Extent
16%
heavily urbanised
Median Annual Flood
29.38 m³/s
QMED — typical yearly peak flow
Highest Recorded Flow
37.49 m³/s
20 Jan 2021
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.
Velocity area station in low-lying catchment containing some large urban areas.
More detail
The catchment
A low lying catchment of gentle relief. Coal Measures within the North overlain by sand and peat; Sherwood Sandstone in the South, overlain by Boulder Clay. Mixed farmland predominates but contains urban areas, including St Helens in the centre. Possible that there was a small increase in catchment area in late 1980s or very early 1990s with diversion of a ditch crossing Sankey Valley Park to join Sankey Brook upstream of the gauging station.
The station
Velocity-area station opened 1953. A trench-piled bed control and stone pitched left bank that was built in July 1983 acts as a weir up to 0.35m, above which it drowns.
How it measures flow
The channel bed is laden with stones and boulders. The highest flows are above bankfull, at 2.66 m on the right bank, but with the possibility of bypassing upstream before this. Susceptible to siltation and weed growth. Backwater problems from sluice operation ceased with closure of adjacent canal in 1976. Rating affected by land drainage improvement works downstream in 1976 and 1977. Subsequent channel regrading required frequent recalibration between 1977 and 1983, and a significant change occurred from the high flows of spring 1981. Multiple ratings applied across period of record. Few spot gaugings at high flows, some scatter. Gauging on 26/09/2012 carried out at Alder Roadbridge upstream of the spill/bypass.
Flow regime
Several small lakes (e.g. Newton Lake) and meres. Industrial abstraction and effluent.
The flow record
Revised daily flow data from start of record (1/1977) to 9/2006 loaded in 10/2009: flows from 17/6/1977 to 30/8/1977 increased by approx 2.5 times. Previous max GDF on 28/12/1978 reduced from 38.5 to 28.9 cumecs, other differences generally minor. Peak flows rejected until July 1983 when the control stabilised the rating. Full period of record peak flow data reviewed and released in August 2021 (WINFAP Files v10).
How this gauging station is built and how long it has measured (NRFA / UKCEH).
Gauge type
Velocity–area
Operating since
1953
Station datum
7.4 mAOD
Flow record
1977–2024 · 47 yrs · 100% complete
Peak-flow record
since 1953
Hydrometric area
69
Measured by
Environment Agency
Nearby Groundwater
Soil Moisture
Possible storm-overflow correlation
🚽 Storm overflows on this river
Frequently asked questions
Is the Sankey Brook at Causey Bridge flooding today?
The current level is 0.23m, which is within the typical range of 0.21 to 2.50m. Flooding is unlikely at this level.
Is the river level rising or falling at Causey Bridge?
Based on the most recent readings, the level is currently steady. The chart above shows the last 7 days of measurements, updated roughly every 15 minutes.
Why is the level slowly falling?
When little or no rain has fallen for a while, a river level gradually drops as the water stored in the ground and soil drains away with nothing to replace it. This is called baseflow recession and is normal in dry spells. Only about 0.0mm of rain has fallen nearby in the last 7 days, so the flow is being sustained mainly by groundwater. A gentle decline like this is expected and is not a sign of a problem — downstream gauges often recede a little faster than headwaters further upstream, and levels recover once rain returns.
What is a normal level for the Sankey Brook at Causey Bridge?
The typical range at this station is 0.21m to 2.50m, based on Environment Agency historical data. Levels above 2.50m are higher than usually seen and may indicate a flood risk.
How often is this river level data updated?
Readings are taken by the Environment Agency gauge roughly every 15 minutes and FloodRadar refreshes its data continuously, so the level shown is normally less than an hour old.
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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:
