The river is shown dark blue. When it overtops its banks to the north, water flows as shown in red. Often, no properties are affected. If flooding is more severe, water flows down driveways (purple arrows) and back to the river alongside houses and garages. In very severe floods, water flows as shown in light blue also.

The key lesson from these floods for my home is that only a slight flow of water across the top of my driveway is sufficient to fill the area in front of my garage to a depth of 300mm if the flood relief channel alongside the garage gets blocked with debris.

Only when the depth exceeds 300mm does water flow north across my front lawn and back to the river.

Unlike the flood of 7 July 2012, this one occurred at night - when I was at a dance in Exeter.

These photographs are mostly from the day after - 25 November 2012.

Water had overtopped my driveway and completely inundated the front garden.

Piles of twigs can be seen against the front of the caravan. The paving slabs are covered in about 6 to 10mm of mud.

The old car is a 1985 Saab 900i. I bought it in 1988 and ran it until 2007 when the gearbox finally expired after 250,000 miles.

After being cannibalised for parts, it was finally scrapped in 2018.

The driveway was a complete mess with large accumulations of mud and piles of twigs and leaves. The single 110mm surface water drain was completely blocked.

The garage carpets were sodden.

Electrical power had become disconnected because the freezer in the garage had been under a few mm of water - just enough to inundate an electrical junction box.

The peak flood was at around midnight. By the time I arrived home at 1am the water had drained sufficiently to permit power to be restored - the earth leakage trip now sensing that all circuits were again safe.

All of the pathway had been covered in mud - the first job was to hose down a walkway to the front door.

This whole area had been a mass of swirling water - up to 300mm deep.

Just a pity I wasn't home to see it!

With carpets removed it was clear that half to 2/3 of the garage floor was covered with a thin layer of silt.

When I built the garage a decade ago, I had the floor laid on a slight slope so it could easily be washed out - a sound idea.

An even better idea would have been not to store so many things on it.

Residents need to learn the importance of clearing road drains of twigs and leaves.

Whilst the road does flood from time to time, the quantities of water involved are often small and could probably be accommodated, at least in part, by the drains, provided these were kept clear.

On the morning after the flood, they were all blocked.

Clearing all drains would be of most benefit to householders at the southern end of the Close - and it was these who suffered the most, owing to their houses having been constructed before Building Regulations required that floor levels be raised 600mm above flood plains.

This house at the end of Packhorse Close was sold to its new owners earlier in 2012.

As of 2016 further fencing and walls have been built and the garden can be protected by using a few sandbags across the driveway.

This action would of course increase the risks for the few householders who do not have protection measures either in place or easy to hand.

Too little, too late.

This is the main road drain at the junction of Packhorse Close to the main A3052.

It is at the lowest point of the road in this area. When the Sid overtops its banks to the north of the bridge there can be up to 400mm of flood water here.

In the floods of July 2012 this drain stayed clear, but in November's floods the river water brought with it far more twigs and leaves. These blocked all the local road drains.

The mass of swirling water around this drain in the July 2012 floods is shown on an earlier webpage.

The visibility splay beside the A3052 was deep in water and debris - the first time this has happened in over 20 years, and according to local people, in well over 30 years.

This may not have happened at all (or have been less severe) if the river bed level had been much lower before the deluge of 24 November.

The ferocity of the water was so great it started to dig at the foundations of this roadside fence.

The river also made some attempt to gouge out part of this defensive wall. The vegetation may grow back and knit the area together before the next flood.

The aftermath - this was becoming a little too frequent in 2012 but as of 2017 no further floods on this scale have occurred.

This is the critical flood relief channel down the side of my garage. It is the only escape route for water that overtops the head of the driveway (by the road) once the single surface water drain becomes blocked.

However, on this occasion (and in my absence) the flood water picked up a spare tyre and wheel that had been propped against the conservatory door and wedged it in the location shown. Twigs and leaves then built up both around this and around the self-seeded ash sapling.

But worse was to come.

The flood water also picked up two wooden blocks (shown red) that had been left on my driveway and wedged them firmly against an old fence post that I had left in place to mark the line of the original boundary fence, before I built my garage.

The resulting log-jam caused a build up of other debris and the relief channel became severely restricted. Flood water in channels such as this is conveyed by only a small pressure head - often only a few cm of water - and even slight impediments to flow may not be swept aside.

This is the principal lesson for the future - ensure that this flood relief channel stays clear.

The post has since been cut down.

Despite 300mm of water against it, the maximum depth of water in the garage at the front end was 10mm, tapering to zero about half way to the rear.

The river level at the back of the garage was exactly to the threshold of the rear door - which is also overdue for additional flood defences.

All my airbricks are permanently protected to 1000mm over this height of flood.

When water reaches the level shown here, it starts to flow across the front lawn and down the north side of my house. Thus, this level should rarely if ever be much exceeded.

Famous last words?

Large areas of garden were covered in up to 120mm of silt.

The water flow patterns were quite different from those in July 2012 because the flood water flowed not only through the arches of the bridge and over the garden but quite forcibly down the side and through the hedge.

Much of the extra destruction may have been owing to the river bed having been so high immediately before the downpours of 24 November.

Thus, the EA need to be especially aware of the importance of dredging excess material from the riverbed at Sidford whenever an opportunity occurs.

The excess depth after 24 November was around 600mm. The area was subsequently dredged on 17/18 December 2012.

The drain from my garage roof goes into a single 110mm pipe - the arrangement works well but is here covered in 50mm of silt and leaves.

The working of the drain to discharge water from the roof was unaffected - it just no longer worked as a surface water drain. But such a function is not required in this location, so the mud didn't really matter.

The tide line of twigs on my neighbour's pristine lawn is witness to the peak level of the river - they were away at the time and so missed all the excitement!

Their new garden shed survived but the floor was covered in mud.

The door of my conservatory is a first line of defence against floods on the driveway. I built the whole conservatory to be especially strong and waterproof. With a little extra buttressing the door easily held against 300mm of water.

Probably less than a litre of water seeped through - but even if the door seals gave way under the force of a much greater depth of water, the house is further protected by very strong flood boards to the height of the conservatory windows.

Such a level might be reached in a 1 in 1000 year flood - and half of Sidford would then be underwater.

Part of the mud collected from the front driveway.

This was dumped in my front hedge to help boost defences for next time.

Neighbours opposite deployed conventional defences - I could do the same but this would have adverse consequences for the rest of the Close because so much water flows naturally over my garden back to the river - or at least it did before I built my double garage (with full planning permission!).

With defences of this type being used by an increasing number of residents, keeping road drains clear will be even more important to help limit the amount of water that reaches the bungalows at the end of the road.

As it nears the sea, the Sid once again needs to be managed more comprehensively in order to limit damage to property.

These boulders were part of the defences at the bottom of Sid Park Road. Similar damage occurred nearby both in July 2012 and in November 2012.

As of 2018 no repairs have been undertaken, probably owing to cutbacks in EA funding.

A local resident told me that in nearly 30 years he has never seen the water so high as on the night of 24 November. A layer of silt on the bridge surface bears witness to his assertion that it was just lapping over the foot way. Structurally the bridge survived very well.

This photo was taken a week after the November flood. As happened in July 2012 also, The Byes parkland returned to normal very quickly. The only remaining signs were a few broken bridge handrails, areas of silt, some displaced stones and boulders and piles of leaves and twigs.

In fairness, it had already been repaired (patched up) several times and much of the wood may have been half rotten.

The flood therefore merely brought forward the date for complete reinstatement of the railings and decking surface.

In November's flood, a section of  wall downstream of the Mill St footbridge was demolished.

The damage in this case looks to be as much decorative as it is structural.

It was later rebuilt.

Several 'protest groups' in Sidmouth have seen saving Alma Bridge as supremely important. They argue it is a 'lifeline' for residents living on the east side of town.

In reality it is as much an icon as a useful asset now that the coastal footpath has been diverted away from the crumbling and collapsing cliffs nearby.

As of 2016 it is accepted that the bridge cannot be save and a new crossing further upstream may be constructed - but at what cost and how long will that last before it is compromised?

At a rough estimate it comprises 100 bricks and mortar with some backing concrete. It is probably made from dense solid bricks so each may weigh about 3 kilo with mortar - so the total weight may be approaching half a tonne.

Bricks are not actually very dense - typically 2000kg/cu.m (kilo per cubic metre) about twice the density of water. Granite boulders, often used for flood defences have a density of around 2700 kg/cu.m.

Whilst much is made of the need for 'sea defences' to protect these cliffs, much of the erosion and collapse of large sections of cliff is caused primarily by rain water.

Even if sea defences were installed the cliff face would continue to retreat until a stable angle was reached - and by that time the houses on Cliff Road would have lost maybe half or more of their remaining gardens. Even then, erosion would continue. It may be only a matter of time before some or all of these substantial houses become worthless.

The same might be true today for many low lying houses in Sidmouth had not the river Sid been comprehensively 'managed and tamed' over the last 50 years.

Problems along this part of the coast became more severe when EDDC replaced the old wooden groynes that had served well to protect Sidmouth beach. The new rock 'islands' altered wave and water flow patterns to the east -  and all the beach shingle disappeared. Predictions that this would happen had been discounted by EDDC.