When flood water was admitted to the channel, the flows were well short of its designed maximum flow capacity, and yet there was significant erosion of the banks in several places. There was considerable erosion at the Taplow Sluice, due to the lack of a stilling basin; embankments at Marsh Lane were badly damaged; the weir at Manor Farm was bent in the middle; the protection on the downstream face of Slough weir was swept away; and in Datchet, the Myrke embankment nearly collapsed. An independent assessment by the engineering consultancy WS Atkins identified that the actual capacity of the channel was around two-thirds of its design capacity, and factors affecting this were the banks being too low, the use of inappropriate materials, and failure to follow standard design criteria. A programme of repairs and upgrades to rectify the problems began, at a cost of £3.5 million, and took until 2006 to complete. The Environment Agency sued their lead design consultants for recovery of the remedial costs, and were refunded £2.75 million in an out-of-court settlement, after they admitted that the design and construction were sub-standard.