Well I was near Bill's village yesterday, and the Aire was down a bit, but due to rise. The riverbank is designed to flood away from his village, but it is what works its way around from overloaded flood plains that presents a problem, as it does for my village (Hensall). It stops our village beck flowing, and backs it all up. It then floods up to where it is piped through, and works round from the top end, where it can't enter the piping. Snaith, the next place along upstream from Bill's, and then Gowdall, the one before my village, are on red alert. I hear George street in Snaith has had some flooding and people have been evacuated. Some have refused to leave. The car sales place near the river has moved all the cars, although they didn't get hit at the weekend. There is a drainage ditch between the field and them, but a lot will depend on how much work it can do. Gowdall is in worse immediate danger than Snaith, and has been all along, as it is right by the river and the overflow from the floodplains comes there first from very nearby. The A645 is still closed at Little Heck, just south of Gowdall, due to flooding (there's a deep dip in it under a railway bridge). And I have my daughter's boyfriend from Selby staying with me as he works this way, and his house is full of family evacuated from Barlby, near Selby, which has been badly hit. I did hear a whispered rumour last night that Drax power station might be at risk of flooding. It is on the Ouse.

Where are you, exactly, Cobble? Are you east or west bank? Bill and I are on the Aire. The rain is battering down at the moment (6am Tuesday) but we had a dry afternoon yesterday, and the high winds thankfully don't seem to have come to us.(Yet?)

I count myself very fortunate being on a slight rise. We are only about 30 feet above sea level round here, so tidal rivers, extra rain and rising sea levels all could affect us in this area to some degree.

I wonder how Ian Stephenson and his dad WindyB are coping? The Aire floods near them, and they aren't far from the river.

Andrea