United Cavers Exploration Team

Most of you are very familiar with the bone dry river bed of the Alyn.

Looking for an excuse to test my new fluid tripod head i nipped out in the Landy with Joshua to check out the Alyn in full flood following heavy rain in April 2012.

The River Alyn formed around 9000BC at the end of the last Ice Age. Gradually cutting a deep scar in the Flintshire landscape over the ages, and cutting equally impressive caves through the limestone below. Eventually man interrupted the course of nature by digging a drainage tunnel from the coast right under the area in order to drain around 100miles of mine workings, dating between Roman times and the 1980's. Since the 60's this has had such a marked effect on the water table that most of the year the River Alyn looses all of its water at loggerheads through fishures in the rock which causes the river bed to be totally dry for most of the year. Only under flood conditions does the flow become so great that it exceeds the capacity of the underground route and the river once again flows via its age old route. This video shows the river in full flood, early in April 2012 after a period of prolonged heavy rain.

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