UK weather: Storm Christoph brings heavy rain, gales and floods to UK

19 January 2021, 07:49

An Amber weather warning for rain has been issued by the Met Office for parts of England between Tuesday and Thursday.

A major incident has been declared in South Yorkshire as Storm Christoph looks set to bring gales and floods to the UK.

An Amber weather warning for rain has been issued for parts of central northern England, which affects an area around Manchester, Leeds and Sheffield and stretches down to Peterborough.

The major incident in South Yorkshire was declared in preparation for flooding, with Ros Jones - Mayor of Doncaster - saying that sandbags were being handed out to areas at high risk.

She tweeted: "I do not want people to panic, but flooding is possible so please be prepared."

Catherine Wright, acting executive director for flood and coastal risk management at the Environment Agency, said, according to the Telegraph: "That rain is falling on very wet ground and so we are very concerned that it's a very volatile situation and we are expecting significant flooding to occur on the back of that weather."

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She added that the Environmental Agency will be working with local councils if flood evacuation is necessary, adding: "If you do need to evacuate then that is allowed within the Covid rules the Government has."

The Environmental Agency has issued 10 flood warnings for parts of Yorkshire, Cambridgeshire and Lincolnshire as of last night, and 109 more flood alerts are in place across northern England, the Midlands, and east England, meaning flooding is possible.

Heavy rain is expected in parts of the country overnight tonight (Tuesday 19 January), and a yellow rain alert is in place for much of northern England and Wales for Tuesday to Wednesday, and a yellow weather warning for snow and ice is in place in Scotland from Dundee to Elgin and across the east coast from Wednesday afternoon until midday on Thursday.

Met Office Chief Meteorologist Dan Suri, said: “Following a cold spell where the main hazard was snow, our focus now turns to notably heavy rain moving across the UK this week. Some locations could see over 100mm of rain falling through the course just a couple of days with up to 200mm possible over higher ground. These amounts of rainfall along with snow melt present a real threat of flooding and people should keep a close eye on flood warnings from the Environment Agency and Natural Resources Wales.

“As the system moves away into the North Sea Wednesday night and Thursday morning there will be strong winds along the east coast for a time. Meanwhile, colder air coming southwards into the weather system brings the risk of further snow on the back edge of this system. Temperatures will gradually fall across the UK through the end of the week and into the weekend bringing a return to widespread overnight frosts."

Calmer conditions look set to be in place by Friday, with a Met Office spokesperson saying, according to the Mirror: "It's a very unsettled period as we go through the week until Friday where we see colder air from the North pushing away the low pressure, so we expect a fine cold day on Friday."

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