Pirbright Parish Council

The Environment Agency are pleased to be able to offer residents and businesses in Pirbright a new free flood warning service from the end of August 2022. 

We work with mobile network providers to automatically register people at risk of flooding to the new service. The service is anonymous and free. If residents and businesses have a phone that is registered in an area at risk of flooding, and they are with a participating mobile network provider, they may receive a text message explaining that we will contact them when a flood warning is issued. This does not create an account with full details because the mobile network provider does not share names or addresses with us. We hold phone numbers securely in our flood warning system in line with our privacy notice. 

We will also be contacting residents and businesses in the new flood warning area by post to provide them further information on the new flood warning service, and to offer them the opportunity to register to receive flood warnings.

To get the best experience of the new flood warning service, we recommend that residents and businesses register their details and create a full account by calling Floodline on 0345 988 1188 or visit our website https://www.gov.uk/sign-up-for-flood-warnings. We will then register their preferred contact details. 

Flood warnings give people valuable time to prepare for flooding – time that allows people to move themselves, their families, and precious items to safety. Flood warnings save lives and enable the emergency services to prepare and help communities.

What you can expect from the service

The new service is intended to target all properties at high risk of river flooding from the Hodge Brook, however some properties at lower risk are included in the service. The service includes 55 properties in your area. 

We use the latest technology to monitor rainfall and river levels 24 hours a day to forecast flooding. When residents and businesses are registered they will receive a flood warning when we believe properties in the flood warning area are expected to flood.

The accuracy of flood warnings improves over time as we gather more data and get a better understanding of how the river reacts to heavy rainfall.  As this is a brand new service there may be a higher than normal occurrence of false alarms initially.

In some built up residential areas flooding can happen extremely quickly after heavy rain. This means that flooding could occur very soon after a flood warning is issued, so people may need to act fast. 

In some circumstances there may be no time to issue a flood warning in advance so it's important to be prepared, know the signs to look out for and stay alert.

It is important for us to verify what happens every time a flood warning is issued to improve the service. To do this, we deploy staff to affected areas to validate flood extents and our warning alarm levels to improve the accuracy of our warnings.

We welcome your involvement to improve the service. You can help by reporting and recording any actual flooding to Floodline on 0345 988 11 88 or our Incident Communication Service on 0800 80 70 60.

Further information and advice

Please see the attached service factsheet for more information on the new flood warning service and how to prepare for flooding.  You can find information on our website at www.gov.uk/flood.

You can check flood risk online at www.gov.uk/check-flood-risk.

Further independent information to help you prepare for flooding can be found on the National Flood forum website nationalfloodforum.org.uk.

If you have any queries, please contact fim.wal@environment-agency.gov.uk or call Floodline 0345 988 1188. 

Thames Area Flood Resilience Team 

Environment Agency