Advertisement

Powerful storm Eowyn turns deadly as it sweeps across Britain, Ireland, Scotland

Storm Eowyn Friday continued to cause power outages for hundreds of thousands, knocked down trees and disrupted transportation as it moved across Scotland and Northern Ireland into Britain's West Midlands region. A fallen tree blown over by Eowyn is seen on Donegal Road, Belfast, Northern Ireland Friday. Photo by Marie Therese Hurson/EPA-EFE
Storm Eowyn Friday continued to cause power outages for hundreds of thousands, knocked down trees and disrupted transportation as it moved across Scotland and Northern Ireland into Britain's West Midlands region. A fallen tree blown over by Eowyn is seen on Donegal Road, Belfast, Northern Ireland Friday. Photo by Marie Therese Hurson/EPA-EFE

Jan. 24 (UPI) -- Storm Eowyn Friday continued to cause power outages for hundreds of thousands of people, knocked down trees and disrupted transportation as it moved across Scotland and Northern Ireland into Britain's West Midlands region.

The storm was a powerful and rare "weather bomb" that caused widespread damage from Ireland to Scotland and the British West Midlands.

Advertisement

One man died in a road traffic incident in Ireland's County Donegal early Friday as the storm came ashore there, authorities told national broadcaster RTE.

In Ireland, 725,000 lost power as storm winds reached more than 100 mph. By 5:25 p.m. local time, power had been restored to 143,000 customers but 625,000 others remained in the dark.

"The impact on customers and damage to the electricity network nationwide is unprecedented," Irish power utility ESB Networks said, adding that crews were being deployed "where safe to do so" following the lifting of red and orange wind warnings by the weather agency Met Éireann.

Advertisement

"Power restoration will continue into the evening and commence once again at first light tomorrow morning, and we expect to make good progress restoring supplies over the weekend and into next week," ESB said, but warned that due to the severity of Storm Éowyn, "we expect that power restoration will take more than a week in the worst impacted areas."

Wind gusts of unprecedented severity were recorded across Ireland early on Friday, including a gust of 113.7 mph at Mace Head in County Galway at 5 a.m. -- the highest wind gust ever recorded in Ireland, according to weather officials.

The mean wind speed at Mace Head was 81.4 mph, similarly the highest mean wind speed ever seen in Ireland.

Meanwhile, about 138,000 people across Ireland had no water by Friday evening due to Storm Éowyn, while supplies for a further 750,000 people were "at risk," water provider Uisce Eireann reported, adding those numbers were likely to increase due to "widespread power outages at treatment plants and pumping stations continue to impact on supplies."

Advertisement

More than 1,000 flights were cancelled and some main roads were closed in Britain and Ireland.

"The worst of Storm Eowyn has now passed for most of the country, but with Met Eireann wind warnings remaining in place further outages may still arise," the Electricity Supply Board Networks said in a statement.

ScotRail said the full extent of the damage to rail lines won't be known until a full assessment is in from Network Rail. No trains will run in Scotland until midday Saturday at the earliest.

Packing high winds in northern England, Scotland and Northern Ireland, the storm's winds died down somewhat in the West Midlands, but still gusted over 50 mph in some places.

According to National Rail, overhead electric lines between Walsall and Birmingham New Street were damaged.

Heavy rain from the storm was expected to happen through the weekend, triggering a yellow weather warning from Britain's Met Office weather service.

Rail travel was disrupted by the storm and some flights from Birmingham Airport to Belfast, Dublin, Glasgow, Aberdeen and Paris were cancelled.

In Ireland's County Leitrim, 61 year-old Paul Butler said Friday there was no estimate as to when power would be restored, and he said he was glad he bought a generator last year.

Advertisement

"We have trees ripped off their stumps lying in the garden, the roof of our neighbor's outhouse has been torn and a chimney pot fell off her roof just missing her car," he told The Guardian.

He estimated it could take eight or nine days for power to be restored.

Latest Headlines