- 14 hours ago
The UK is due to be hit by gale-force winds of up to 80mph as the first named storm of the season approaches.The Met Office has issued a number of weather warnings ahead of Storm Amy, which is expected to bring “very strong winds and heavy rain” to northern and western areas.Yellow weather warnings for wind are in place for Scotland, Northern Ireland and parts of north and north-west England on Friday and Saturday, including a risk of danger to life.The first named storm of the 2025/26 season will see gusts widely reaching 50 to 60mph in northern Britain, potentially reaching 70-80mph in places.
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00:00Storm Amy is coming. The first storm of the 2025-26 season is going to arrive as we go through this Friday, October the 3rd, into Saturday, October the 4th.
00:12And it is going to bring some very wet but also very windy weather with the potential for some damaging winds, particularly across some northern parts.
00:20Now, there is still a bit of uncertainty, particularly when it comes to the details. We still need to firm up on those.
00:27But what do we know? Well, we know that a deep area of low pressure is heading our way and it is going to bring some stormy weather, like I say, particularly across northern parts.
00:38Let's delve into this. So currently we have a strong jet, a very active jet stream, and it's this that's driving unsettled weather across some parts towards the north and west at the moment.
00:47And it's going to be driving that area of low pressure towards us.
00:51But let's run through very quickly the next few days, because if you want more detail on the weather through the next couple of days, check out our daily weather videos, which are available on YouTube and our app and our website.
01:03But we do have fronts pushing into parts of Scotland, Northern Ireland, Northern England as we go through Wednesday, Thursday and into Friday.
01:11And they are bringing some heavy rain. Now, worth highlighting that there is an area of low pressure that develops as we go through into Thursday.
01:18That is going to bring some blustery, windy weather to northern areas, but nothing on the scale of what we're going to see this weekend, particularly Friday night and into Saturday when Storm Amy arrives.
01:30A much deeper area of low pressure that's likely to track quite close to around northern parts of Scotland.
01:36But first, let's look at how this feature is set to develop and let's run back to, well, kind of current time through Wednesday afternoon.
01:46The low pressure system that will become Amy hasn't yet developed.
01:51What we do have, if I get rid of the jet stream, is we do have two hurricanes on the other side of the Atlantic.
01:57We have Umberto and also Imelda, and these are going to interact with each other.
02:02And then if we run it through, a separate area of low pressure is going to develop as we go through the end of Wednesday.
02:10And it's this that becomes Storm Amy.
02:13Now, worth noting that Umberto does feed into Amy and they sort of merge together and that helps intensify it.
02:20But if I put the jet stream back on now, the track that Amy takes is incredibly important because initially it's on the southern side, the warmer side of the jet.
02:30But as we go through Friday, the forecast track has it taking it, has it going across the jet stream and moving to the colder northern side.
02:40And when it crosses the jet and ends up on that left jet exit region, well, that means it's going to intensify rapidly and it's going to continue to intensify.
02:50It's going to continue to deepen as a feature as we get, as it gets closer to the UK as we go through Friday.
02:57And you can see that if I get rid of the jet stream again, you can see how tightly packed those isobars are, the tighter they are together, the greater the pressure gradient, the greater the strength of the winds will be.
03:09And you can see they continue to deepen as it goes very close to just to the north of the UK, bringing some intense winds.
03:18Now, the fact that it's still deepening as it gets close to the UK is important for two reasons.
03:24One, because until it's fully deepened, there will always be some uncertainty as to exactly how deep it's going to be, how intense a feature and therefore how strong the winds are going to be.
03:34But also the fact that it's deepening as it gets so close to the UK just emphasises the fact that it is going to be a deep area of low pressure.
03:42And that's why we're going to see some very windy weather.
03:47Now, as well as the wind, we do need to watch out for the rain.
03:51So let's look at the details when it comes to the rain that's pushing through before I go on to the wind speeds that we can expect.
03:58So this is Friday.
04:00Like I said, there is some more unsettled weather towards the north and west before then, warnings out.
04:04But it's a band of rain that sweeps through as we go through Friday itself, through Friday afternoon.
04:10Now, this is going to be heavy, some persistent rain, particularly across the northern two thirds of the UK.
04:15Further south, there will be some rain pushing through, but not as heavy, not as intense.
04:20But a persistent band of rain pushing through as we go through Friday afternoon.
04:24And then we have another band of rain following in behind.
04:27This one, though, doesn't look like it will be quite as wide, but quite an intense band of rain that pushes in as we go through overnight into Saturday.
04:35Just to go back a little bit, because there are a few things that I wanted to highlight.
04:39Notice the wraparound.
04:41This is a band of rain coming round.
04:44And that's going to then push into the western isles as we go through later Friday.
04:49And that's going to continue to bring more wet weather to Orkney and Shetland as well, as the whole feature clears away as we go through Saturday.
04:55Once the low pressure centre that is storming, it clears away towards the northeast as we go through Saturday into Sunday.
05:02We end up with this brisk northwesterly flow, and that's going to pile in plenty of showers.
05:07So, yes, we are expecting some heavy rain to arrive through Friday, and that could cause some localised issues.
05:14Then that clears through, and then we end up in a very showery setup.
05:18These showers could be heavy, they could be thundery, and they are going to be very blustery, very windy as well.
05:23But let's look at those wind speeds that we can expect then.
05:26And as we go through Friday, let's dart ahead to this coming Friday.
05:31And just to run through, as we go through the afternoon into the evening, that's when we're really going to see the wind strengthen.
05:38Again, you can see that wraparound because of here, this is where the low pressure is likely to be centred.
05:44And you can see that wraparound, the strongest winds pushing into the Western Isles as we go through Friday night.
05:50That's where we have the risk of gusts in excess of 80 miles per hour.
05:54But also worth noting, strong winds pushing into the far northern parts of Northern Ireland.
05:59Some feeding up the Irish Sea, clipping western parts of England, perhaps even parts of Wales as well.
06:04And also some south-southeasterly winds pushing up and affecting Aberdeenshire, Orkney and Shetland as well.
06:10So a lot of windy weather around then, all of that pushes through.
06:14But we continue with the strong winds as we go through into Saturday, albeit not quite as strong as they will have been through Friday evening.
06:22But nonetheless, worth bearing in mind, far north of Scotland, Orkney and Shetland staying very windy here,
06:27albeit the winds coming from a different direction by this point as we go through much of Saturday.
06:32And continuing then with that showery setup that I showed you, the winds piling in from the northwest.
06:39And so we're going to continue to see some strong, potentially damaging winds coming in from the northwest as we go through parts of Saturday as well.
06:48In terms of the warnings that we have out then as a result of this, well, we do have a couple.
06:54Well, there are a couple of warnings that we have currently out.
06:59At the time of recording, we have a warning across parts of Northern Ireland for strong winds.
07:04That's valid at the moment from four o'clock on Friday afternoon all the way until six o'clock Saturday morning.
07:10And then a much bigger warning across the whole of Scotland, some parts of northwest England and the far north of Wales.
07:17And that's valid from six o'clock on Friday evening all the way until the end of the day on Saturday.
07:22So midnight Saturday into Sunday.
07:23Within these warning areas, there's the potential for 50 to 60 mile per hour gusts quite widely,
07:29potentially 60 to 70 miles per hour in some exposed spots and maybe in excess of 80 miles per hour,
07:36particularly around those western, northwestern parts of Scotland as we go through Friday night into Saturday.
07:41The winds are gradually easing as we go through Saturday, but nonetheless still some strong winds across particularly northern parts of Scotland
07:48through large chunks of Saturday, which is why the warning stays valid for such a long period of time.
07:53Because of these sort of winds, well, there's the risk of some disruption, as you would expect.
07:59There will be some travel disruption.
08:01So some roads, some bridges could be closed.
08:04Ferries could be cancelled.
08:05There'll be disruption to trains on other roads and also to planes as well.
08:10There's also the risk of some power cuts and with that, other services could be disrupted.
08:15So there could be some mobile phone outages as well.
08:19Also need to bear in mind that trees could be blown down.
08:21There could be some blown branches.
08:23There could be a little bit of damage to property with loose roof tiles perhaps being blown around.
08:28So some flying debris.
08:29So particularly during Friday evening, overnight, early Saturday and perhaps into Saturday itself across northern parts,
08:37do be aware if you need to travel, well, maybe consider altering your plans a little bit.
08:43If you do have any outdoor plans, then they may need to change and try to avoid going out as well
08:47because of the potential damage to property, the potential danger that the strong winds will be posing.
08:55These warnings are the current ones that we have out.
08:58As the details firm up, as we get nearer the time, they are going to get tweaked.
09:02They are going to get changed.
09:03So they are worth keeping on top of.
09:06Why is there some uncertainty?
09:07Well, the exact track that the low pressure takes is still a little bit uncertain.
09:13Here I have a couple of models behind me.
09:15So I have the Met Office model in the top left, then the European ECMWF in the top right,
09:20the GFS, the American model in the bottom left, and then ICON, the German model in the bottom right.
09:26And they have the low pressure coming through slightly different places
09:30and ever so slightly in different depths, intensities.
09:34And so because there's some uncertainty as to exactly how close it is going to come to the UK,
09:39notice the Met Office model has it a bit closer to the UK than, for example,
09:43the global model and also has it a bit deeper,
09:46because there's some uncertainty exactly how strong those winds are going to be
09:50and exactly where we see those strongest winds.
09:53Well, that's the detail that we just need to firm up on as we get nearer the time.
09:57I can show you that in another way if I get my ECMWF charts up.
10:02And if we run through to, let's go to Friday and pause it here,
10:06and also let's put my forecast tracks on.
10:09And if I run through to Friday evening, and what you can see is this is most likely
10:15the low is going to fringe somewhere just close to the north-northwest of Scotland.
10:20And so always the strongest winds will be on the southern-southwestern flank of that low.
10:26And so that's why it's in this part of northwest Scotland where we're going to see the strongest winds.
10:29But it is just worth bearing in mind that when looking at the potential forecast tracks,
10:34it could be quite a bit further north, and it also could be a little bit further south
10:38and track more across central parts of Scotland.
10:40Now, if it's a bit further south, then whilst the low may therefore be ever so slightly less deep,
10:47and so the absolute strongest winds might be a little bit lighter,
10:51the impact could be a bit more widespread with strong damaging winds pushing further south as well.
10:57So because there's still some uncertainty as to the exact track that the low takes,
11:02and also uncertainty as to exactly how deep it's going to get,
11:06there are going to still be some question marks as to exactly how impactful a storm this is going to be.
11:11But nonetheless, it is going to be wet, and it is going to be very windy for many places,
11:16particularly across northern parts of the UK as we go through this Friday and into Saturday.
11:21So what can you do?
11:22Well, like I said, if you do have any plans planning to travel through Friday into Saturday,
11:26maybe you might need to adjust your plans accordingly.
11:29Stay up to date with the warnings as they are going to get tweaked,
11:32and share this information, share this video, share everything that I've been telling you
11:36with anyone who you think may be impacted by Storm Amy as well.
11:40I hope you enjoyed this and found it interesting.
11:42I'll see you again soon.
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