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The deposition of layers of sand over wide areas at the time, discovered in boreholes in the ground from north Devon to Gloucestershire to the Gower; The chronicle states that in Bristol itself ‘all the lower part were drowned about four or five foot’ while the flood 'came so fast and high at Henbury that the waters continued a long time a fathom deep that the people were obliged to abide on the trees two or three days’,” she added. One thing is for sure however, the tsunami or storm surge utterly destroyed settlements for miles around.
The speed of the wave appears to have been faster than a storm flood as the wave is ‘affirmed to have runne with a swiftness so incredible, as that no gray-hounde could have escaped by running before them’. Surviving evidence of the tsunami The flood reached a speed of 30mph and a height of 25ft. It swept up to four miles inland in the Bristol area, north Devon, Pembrokeshire, Glamorgan, Monmouthshire and Cardiff - and up to 14 miles inland in low-lying parts of Somerset. A certain man and woman having taken a tree for their succour, espying nothing but death before their eyes, at last among other things which were carried along, they perceived a certain tubbe of great bignesse to come nearer and nearer unto them, until it rested upon that tree wherein they were, committed themselves, and were carried safe until they were cast upon the drie shore”. It seemed initially fairly preposterous in 2002, when a research paper by Prof Simon Haslett, of Bath Spa University, and Australian geologist Ted Bryant, of the University of Wollongong in Australia, suggested that the evidence actually showed the Great Bristol Channel Flood was a tsunami and not just a high tide and storm surge. It includes eye-witness accounts of a range of extreme weather events in the 1500s and 1600s, including the devastating flood on January 30, 1607.As there were no newspapers at the time, the only remaining accounts of the devastation were in the form of letters and pamphlets. The village of Brean was washed away, as were many others all along the coast of North Somerset. Anywhere low-lying was inundated with sea water, and hundreds - probably thousands of people died on both sides of the Channel. The British Geological Survey has said there was no evidence of a landslide off a continental shelf, so any tsunami would have likely been caused by an earthquake on a known unstable fault off the southwest of Ireland. The flood was commemorated in a contemporary pamphlet entitled God's warning to the people of England by the great overflowing of the waters or floods. [23]
Various reports at the time put the day the Great Flood happened between January 20 and January 31. The tops of trees a man may behold remaining above the waters, on whose branches multitudes of turkeys, hens and other such like poultry were fain to fly up to save their lives, where many of them perished for want of relief, not being able to fly to dry land by reason of their weakness".
Flood stories that warn us of danger
Bryant, Edward; Haslett, Simon (2002). "Was the AD 1607 Coastal Flooding Event in the Severn Estuary and Bristol Channel (UK) Due to a Tsunami". Archaeology in the Severn Estuary (13): 163–167. ISSN 1354-7089. By contrast, something massive is needed to create waves with such a great height in the case of a mega-tsunami. Unlike usual tsunamis, mega-tsunamis are caused by giant landslides and other impact events such as volcanic eruptions or huge asteroids crashing into the sea. These phenomena rapidly displace large volumes of water, as energy from falling debris or expansion is transferred to the water." What Sir David King says BBC staff (4 April 2005). "Tsunami theory of flood disaster". BBC News Online . Retrieved 13 November 2010.
Some historical accounts indicate that the weather was fine e.g. “for about nine of the morning, the same being most fayrely and brightly spred, many of the inhabitants of these countreys prepared themselves to their affayres” and the ship at Appldedore (see above) is unlikely to be ready to sail in stormy weather. The denouement felt very contrived, the characters were too inconsistent, and the majority of the story was a massive idiot plot. Why would Susanne bring the one thing she's supposed to be hiding, to the house of the guy she's supposed to be hiding it from? Why would Fortune take them to the first place anyone would look for them? Why would her brother try to free her while there's a massive crowd outside the prison? And if Blood was looking to frame Fortune -and not Susanna- all along, like he claims when he catches her, then why let her go in the first place?The water burst over sea walls from Cardiff round to Bridgwater, flooding the land with water up to 7m above sea level and as far inland as Glastonbury Tor. The florid descriptions of the aftermath give some hint of the depth of the water and the speed it came in.
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