100mph storms leave trail of death and chaos
Pastor Dale Morgan
100mph storms leave trail of death and chaos*
By Richard Savill and Auslan Cramb
Last Updated: 12:02am GMT 21/01/2007
At least 12 people including a two-year-old boy were killed as winds
approaching 100mph battered many parts of Britain yesterday.
Scores of others were injured as the fierce gales brought widespread
transport chaos, damaged buildings and left tens of thousands of homes
without power.
Overturned lorry in a canal
A woman lorry driver was killed when her vehicle was blown off the A629
bypass into a canal
The gusts caused chaos for road, rail and air travellers and closed
ferry ports. Rail companies had to contend with flooding and fallen
trees. Train services were cut and speed restrictions were imposed on
many lines.
Within one half-hour period yesterday afternoon, drivers faced closures
and blockages on nine motorways — the M25, M1, M6, M5, M40, M62, M60,
M42 and M20. Scores of flights were cancelled and Scotland saw its first
significant snowfalls of the year.
The two-year-old, Saurav Ghai, died when a 6ft garden wall collapsed on
him in Belsize Park, north London, at 1.15pm, as he walked with a child
minder. The woman was taken to hospital with injuries. Richard Heard,
49, the managing director of Birmingham International Airport, died on
his way to work at 5.45am when a tree branch smashed through the
windscreen of his four-wheel-drive vehicle.
Ambulance crews were called to the accident on the B4373 near
Bridgnorth, Shropshire, but could not save him. Mr Heard, who was
married with two children, had worked on extensions and improvements to
terminals one and two at the airport and the development of access roads.
The airport paid tribute to "his energy, enthusiasm, capacity for work
and technical knowledge".
Fallen tree crushing car in London
A car is crushed and a house badly damaged as a tree comes crashing down
in storm-force gales whipping through Eaton Square, London
Another fallen tree killed a male passenger in a Ford Fiesta in
Streatley, Berks.
A lorry driver whose vehicle left the road, overturned and landed
part-way in a canal also died. High winds blew her lorry off the A629
Skipton bypass in North Yorkshire.
A German was killed when his lorry was blown on to another vehicle on
the A55, near the Forte Posthouse hotel in Chester.
Another lorry driver died when his vehicle crashed into a car on the A47
south of Ludlow, Shopshire, and plunged down an embankment. The woman
driving the car was seriously injured. A 62-year-old man died after
being blown into a metal shutter and hitting his head in the Strangeways
area of Manchester. A 60-year-old woman was crushed to death when a wall
collapsed as she was trying to shelter from the wind in Marple, near
Stockport, Greater Manchester.
A man in his eighties died of a suspected heart attack outside his home
in Prenton, Wirral, as he tried to secure fencing that had blown loose
in high winds.
Derek Barley, 61, of Manchester, died after being struck by a tree in
Middlewich, Cheshire.
One man was killed and another suffered serious injuries when their car
was struck by a fire engine on emergency call-out to Liverpool John
Lennon Airport after reports that an aircraft was about to make an
emergency landing. Three firemen were taken to hospital with minor injuries.
Two schoolboys, including one thought to have suffered spinal injuries,
were taken to hospital after a tree fell on to them in Merseyside.
Emergency services were called to St Augustine of Canterbury Catholic
High School, St Helens, where a 12-year-old was reported to have serious
injuries.
Crew from the freighter Napoli at Culdrose air base after being plucked
from 60ft waves in the Channel
Crew from the freighter Napoli at Culdrose air base after being plucked
from 60ft waves in the Channel
Twenty-six crew members were rescued from a damaged British container
ship in the English Channel 50 miles off the Lizard in Cornwall. The
crew of the Napoli abandoned ship and took to a lifeboat after the
vessel got into difficulties in force nine gales.
The 62,000-ton vessel was holed and took in water as it made its way
through the Channel.
Two helicopters from RNAS Culdrose, Cornwall, airlifted the crew,
including two 20-year-old Britons, Forbes Duthie and Nicholas Colbourn,
and Bulgarian, Turkish and Indian nationals. Mr Duthie, from Inverness,
said they spent 90 minutes in the raft with waves up to 60ft. It had
been like "the end of the world" when the order came to abandon ship.
The crew were said to be "desperately sea sick and dehydrated".
London Bridge main-line station had to close in mid-afternoon after part
of the station forecourt roof collapsed, blocking a section of the main
concourse. Liverpool Street station closed for similar reasons. A
blackout closed King's Cross Tube station.
Lord's Cricket Ground was strewn with debris after winds damaged the
roof of the Tavern Stand. Firemen were called to free some debris. Kew
Gardens was closed, as was most of Brighton Pier.
Gusts of 99mph were recorded at Needles Old Battery on the Isle of Wight.
In the Peak District, two men who became lost in heavy winds, driving
rain and fog were rescued in the early hours of yesterday. Officers
found them after spotting their torch. Police carried one of them
unconscious for nearly a mile over rocky ground in the dark to an ambulance.
On the M6 in Lancashire police ordered lorries to park while the gales
persisted. Police acted after a lorry blew over, hitting a saloon car.
The M1 and M18 motorways in South Yorkshire were closed in both
directions as police estimated that around 20 lorries were blown over in
the county.
In Scotland, the snow caused problems on the roads and led to the
closure of several primary schools.
The central belt was worst affected, and at one point the A9, the main
road to the north of Scotland, was closed by several inches of snow.
Tayside police reported a spate of minor road accidents.
The Met Office said the weather was expected to be calmer today. But the
temperature is likely to drop sharply this weekend with snow forecast in
northern and eastern England next week.