New names on the impact matrix

October 2026

The Flood Forecasting Centre, the Met Office and the UK's environment agencies now share one impact matrix, so flood guidance and weather warnings use the same words.

Impact Minimal→Minor Minor→Moderate Significant Severe→Extreme
Likelihood Very low→Low Low→Medium Medium→High High→Very high

Colours and overall flood risk levels are unchanged. This site uses the new names throughout, but the text inside older statements keeps the words used when it was issued.

Flood Guidance Statement, 29 September 2019

Issued at
Sunday 29 Sep 2019, 10:30 BST
Overall flood risk Low
Highest impact Moderate
picture_as_pdf PDF table_chart CSV
ID: 1161
Flood Risk Map

campaign Headline

Widespread minor coastal flooding impacts probable over the next three days. Significant river flooding impacts are possible but not expected for the south Pennines today (Sunday) to Tuesday. See end of FGS for days 6-10 forecast.

format_list_bulleted Breakdown by source

Source Overall flood risk Highest impact
River Low Moderate
Surface Water Low Moderate
Groundwater Very Low Minor
Coastal/Tidal Low Moderate

calendar_month 6-10 Day Forecast

A spell of unsettled, wet and windy weather may affect England and Wales during the 6-10 day period, giving the potential for localised flood impacts.

About the Flood Guidance Statement

The Flood Guidance Statement is issued every day by the Flood Forecasting Centre, a partnership of the Environment Agency and the Met Office. It sets out the risk of flooding across England and Wales over the next five days from four sources: rivers, surface water, groundwater and the sea.

Each risk is very low, low, medium or high, and combines how likely flooding is with how severe its impacts could be. The statement is written for emergency responders; for flood warnings where you live, use the GOV.UK flood warning service in England or Natural Resources Wales in Wales.

Every statement is kept in the archive, and the calendars and statistics show how often each level of risk has been reached.