IT is the calm after the storm today as Storm Ciara caused severe disruption in Coventry and Warwickshire over the weekend.
The Met Office says the storm brought widespread gales and wet weather to the UK, with the highest wind gust at lower levels of 97mph at Needles, Isle of Wight and in the West Midlands area, a gust of 61mph was recorded at Coleshill, Warwickshire.
Today (Monday February 10) and tomorrow (Tuesday February 11) the region will see a mixture of brighter weather and a few blustery showers, feeling cold in the breeze with top temperatures of around 6 Celsius.
West Midlands Fire Service received 26 weather related calls yesterday (Sunday February 9) with the majority occurring between 8am and 5pm and seven involving fallen trees.
A spokesman said: “Yesterday the bulk of incident we attended happened between 8am and 5pm. We did have a couple after 5pm but none after 12midnight. We had 26 weather related calls – we call these special service calls. Of these 26, we attended 23 and in the other three we gave appropriate advice, referring to the council. Fifteen of these involved loose roof tiles, chimneys and fascia boards. Seven of these involved fallen trees and one involved a fallen lamppost.”
West Midlands Ambulance Service says it was not called out to any serious weather related incidents.
Due to the extremely high winds Coventry Cathedral Tower and ruins were closed over the weekend as a safety precaution. A statement on the Cathedral’s Twitter feed says: “We will be monitoring the weather over the next couple of days and will only re-open the Tower Climb once we feel that it is safe to do so.”
Today it was reported that a 58-year-old man died on Sunday after a tree fell on his car in Hampshire during Storm Ciara on the A33 just before 4pm. He died at the scene. Elsewhere in the UK, more than 20,000 homes spent the night without power.
Many trains and flights were cancelled or delayed, while drivers faced difficult conditions with flood water, fallen trees and other debris closing roads.
Flightradar24, a global flight tracking service, yesterday reported “very big delays at airports around Europe because of #StormCiara” with 101 cancellations at Birmingham Airport.
A Ryan Air flight was diverted from Birmingham Airport to Manchester due to the extreme conditions. A statement from Ryan Air reads: “This flight from Dublin to Birmingham (February 9) diverted to Manchester due to high winds at Birmingham Airport. The flight landed normally at Manchester, and customers were transferred to Birmingham Airport by coach shortly after.”
This morning a spokeswoman at Birmingham Airport said:”It is business as usual today. There has been no disruption today due to Storm Ciara.”
West Midlands Trains services to and from Coventry are operating as normal today. On Saturday morning it tweeted at 10.20am that a tree was blocking the line at Kenilworth. All services between Leamington Spa and Coventry were suspended. Cross Country trains were also affected on Saturday morning with services unable to call at Birmingham International and Coventry due to a tree on the line.
Customers travelling on Avanti West Coast services – the new train operator which took over from Virgin Trains – face further disruption today due to a number of trains being re-routed. An update on Twitter today said: “Disruption is still expected throughout the day. Please check for live updates before travelling here: http://avantiwestcoast.co.uk/live.”
The Environment Agency has today issued one flood warning in the region. River levels continue to rise at the Eathorpe river gauge, near Princethorpe, in between Rugby and Leamington Spa, as a result of heavy rainfall. Consequently, the risk of flooding remains throughout Monday, (February 10).
