I've just walked over to the river here (the River Crouch) and it's at the level of a spring tide already, a bit worrying as we're still over 2 hours away from HT.  

Thining I might move my car to the other side of town on higher ground...

I've just driven back home from Strood station after an evening out, I nipped along Canal Road and the River Medway was very close to overflowing its banks at 23:15, the flood gates the junction of Canal Road and Rochester Bridge were closed by 23:30.

The underpass from Station Road to Strood station has a large stack of sandbags ready to be deployed to protect Station Road and the many houses at the same level.

Stay safe!

I have followed this event from early this morning, the events taking place have been astonishing and now even more so along the east coast heading south. Take care everyone who may be at risk

Paul S.

From Twitter:

RT @medway_council: Evacuation of up to 300 homes on some streets in Medway by @medway_council & @Kent _police now underway

List of streets here http://www.medway.gov.uk/information/newspages/floodwarning.aspx

Good grief, I know so many of those streets so well!

Suprising lack of reports coming in from East Anglia over the last hour or so, how's it all looking up there?

P,S Jive Buddy, same here :)

Broadstairs: Water now just reached land, but only down by the harbour at present. High point still to come.

Margate: Current height 6.32m, versus 4.48m predicted (surge 1.84, down slightly from 2.04 a little earlier). High tide time should be just after 1:30am.

Live report from Sandwich, where HT is in about 15 mins, everything holding so far.

Environment Agency: No recent updates...but that could just mean they've decided to close early, and go to the pub

I might go take a quick drive down towards the strand and have a look, see what the score is down there and report back

Just taken a quick walk down the end off my road to the river front (Medway), still not overflowed yet, but still have about another 1 1/2 hours before our high tide, although the river does look very calm.

If I'm still awake in about an hour, I'll have another quick walk then.

Sash

Shocking scenes in Hamburg:

https://twitter.com/anthonywx/media

It does seem like Kent escaped the worst so far. Only fly in the ointment, maybe that the storm drains are now reported as full, so we'll await the second surge high around 1pm today with a little trepidation.

Indeed Iain. We are not out of the woods just yet.

I took a walk along to the Folkestone Harbour at first light. The evidence of the high tide at midnight far far in excess of the previous high tides experienced in my life time..For those living in Folkestone there is evidence that the East Head was breached.

Some flooding on the Sussex coast - looks like Newhaven and Shoreham were the only places affected. Afew industrial properties in Newhaven properly flooded and a 'few inches' of water in Shoreham high street; the most serious is that the Seaford - Newhaven - Lewes railway line is closed because water got into the electrics (some reports say signals, some say control gear for power supply)

Listening to the EA spokesman on R Kent a short while ago, and he also mentioned that the defences took quite a pounding last night, so their new fear is that some of them won't hold for the second surge.

So very true! On the other hand I suppose, maybe it supressed 'drama out of no crisis' style reports too. Only people who can really tell us I guess, are those affected....and they'll be too busy cleaning up/preparing for the next.