Tidal surge prediction for Tues 8 Jan

[MikeBz]

The surge predictor is giving a > 1.6m surge at Felixstowe tomorrow at noon:

https://www.ntslf.org/storm-surges/latest-surge-forecast?port=Felixstowe

It backs off to just over 1m at 13:10 which is HW at Harwich. Lucky they're not big forecast tides.

The weather charts don't show anything particularly extreme to cause this. Big high pressure over the Atlantic must be the cause, but pressure over the North Sea isn't particularly low.

 

[dennyjc]

Morning Mike,

Here, on the East coast, the surges are more affected by wind than atmospheric pressure.
The big deal tomorrow is the strong West / South-West in the Lerwick region, forcing more water onto the 'mouth' of the North Sea.
It looks like Harwich will get a 5.0m tide - this is significant.
The flooding on the strand (B1456) will be deep enough to wreck vehicles should anyone try to pass.
I'll be keeping an eye on the Shotley Marina Web cam - just for interest (http://www.shotleymarina.co.uk/domecam.jpg)
Shotley Marina extended the piles after the 5.48m (Harwich) tide of 05/12/13 so the boats there should come to no harm.

The surge predictor is giving a > 1.6m surge at Felixstowe tomorrow at noon:

The weather charts don't show anything particularly extreme to cause this.

 

[MikeBz]

Thanks for the explanation. The weather doesn't look particularly exceptional, but a 1.6m surge is quite extreme - in fact there is almost 2m of surge at Harwich right now - https://hha.co.uk/live-data/tide/.

 

[dolabriform]

It looks really high on the Harwich Webcams

 

[Cantata]

2.3m surge at Southend right now. 1.95m at Margate.
Maybe surge has come well before HW which is 2pm-ish.

 

[Hydrozoan]

The peak surge at Felixstowe seems to have been about 35cm above that forecast. IIRC the RMS error of forecasts is circa 10cm.

 

[DavidofMersea]

It is 3 hours to high water here at Mersea, and already the water is quite high, it looks as if we will have minor flooding

 

[Jan Harber]

At about 9am Harwich was recording a peak surge of 1.95m, which explains why the tide already looked so high at Snape Bridge at 9am when HW was not predicted to be until lunchtime.

Fortunately the surge peak did not coincide with HW times in many places although I've heard there was flooding this afternoon at Wherstead under the Orwell Bridge, at Southwold Harbour Inn and at Oulton Broad.

 

[johnalison]

Didn't even come up to the road in Wivenhoe.

 

[MikeBz]

I heard they closed the barrier?