Scotland hit by once in generation storm - Sky News Australia

Updated: 17:06, Friday December 9, 2011

Forecasters expect some respite on Friday after a huge storm cut power to thousands of homes in Scotland and forced evacuations in northern England.

The storm, packing winds of up to 265 kilometres per hour, caused transport chaos and left more than 55,000 people without electricity on Thursday.

The strongest gales were recorded at the Cairngorms range in the Scottish Highlands, while the main cities of Glasgow and Edinburgh were hit by wind speeds of 113km/h.

Thousands of schools around Glasgow and the west of Scotland were closed, while every major bridge was shut, flights from the main airports were disrupted and train services cut.

In northern England, two people in North Yorkshire were rescued by the Royal Air Force from a partially-submerged car and were airlifted to hospital with suspected hypothermia, emergency services said.

There was heavy rain in the Cumbria region, where police said they received several calls from motorists stuck in floodwater.

The Environment Agency issued seven flood alerts at different locations on 12 rivers and lakes in the county.

Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond has praised the response of emergency crews.

'I've been kept in touch... and I've seen the extraordinary pictures of the exceptionally high winds,' Salmond said during a visit to Hong Kong on Friday.

'Scotland is a windy country but even for Scotland that was a once-in-a-generation experience.'

Salmond said there had been no fatalities reported.

He said Scotland's main power companies expected power to be restored at the weekend.

'There are still about 50,000 people without power but there's 15,000 people working on that.'

'Scotland's a very resilient country and we can take whatever Mother Nature throws at us,' Salmond said.

Forecasters expected some respite on Friday, with the worst of the winds confined to northeast Scotland and the Shetland Islands.