The North Sea Flood of 1953 and associated storm was a major natural disaster which affected the coastlines of the United Kingdom and The Netherlands on the night of 31 January 1953 – 1 February 1953. Belgium, Denmark and France were also affected by flooding and storm damage.
A combination of a high spring tide and a severe European windstorm caused a tidal surge of the North Sea up to 3.36 m which overwhelmed sea defences and caused extensive flooding.
Officially, 1,835 people were killed in The Netherlands, mostly in the south-western province of Zeeland. 307 were killed in the United Kingdom, in the counties of Lincolnshire, Norfolk, Suffolk and Essex.
Further loss of life exceeding 230 occurred on shipping around north European coasts and in the North Sea. The ferry Princess Victoria was lost at sea in the North Channel with 132 fatalities, and many trawlers were sunk.
North Sea Flood in the United Kingdom
The North Sea Flood of 1953 was one of the largest natural disasters ever experienced in the UK. Over 1000 miles (1600 km) of coastline was damaged, and sea walls were breached, inundating 1,000 km². Flooding forced 30,000 people to be evacuated from their homes, and 24,000 properties were seriously damaged.
In individual incidents, 38 died at Felixstowe in Suffolk when wooden prefabricated homes in the West End area of the town were flooded. In Essex, Canvey Island was inundated with the loss of 58 lives and another 37 died when the seafront village of Jaywick near Clacton was flooded.
The total death toll on land in the UK is estimated at 307. The total death toll at sea for the UK, including the Princess Victoria, is estimated at 224.
North Sea Flood in the Netherlands
In the southern provinces of Zeeland, Zuid-Holland, and Noord-Brabant, flooding of islands and polders killed 1,835 people and forced the evacuation of 70,000 more. Ten thousand animals drowned, and 4,500 buildings were destroyed. Floods covered 9% of Dutch agricultural land, and sea water inundated 2,000 km² of polders.
Response
In the UK a major investment was made in new sea defences, and the Thames Barrier programme was started to secure central London against a future storm surge.
In The Netherlands an ambitious flood defence system was conceived and deployed, called the Delta Works (Dutch: Deltawerken), designed to protect the estuary of Rhine and Meuse. The works were completed in 1998 with the completion of the storm surge barrier in the Nieuwe waterweg near Rotterdam.
The future
The threat of another flood on the scale of 1953 remains potent, since the combination of events generating a massive storm surge could reoccur in normal climatic timescales. In addition, two risk factors could increase the likelihood, or the severity, of another incident. Firstly, the south-eastern part of the UK and the western part of the Netherlands are gradually settling lower as other parts lift higher due to isostatic rebound after the disappearance of the glacial sheet from the last ice age. Secondly, sea level may rise as a result of climate change, which may also cause more frequent and severer storms.
Flood barriers, improved weather forecasting, modern communications and sophisticated emergency services may help to reduce the potential loss of life from a future flood, but this must be balanced by the impact of higher population densities, property investments and, especially in the UK, by the decay of coastal defences since the 1950s improvements.
References
The most accurate assessment of UK deaths in 1953 is by Ilan Kelman for CURBE (Cambridge University Centre for Risk in the Built Environment) [1]
See also
External links