Storm Babet continued pummeling the United Kingdom (UK) on Friday with heavy rain and flooding, prompting weather experts to issue a rare weather warning as residents battled dangerous conditions.
Videos and photos shared on social media helped document the storm’s impact. In one video SkyNews shared on X, formerly Twitter, Scotland’s North Esk river levels could be seen rising as Babet took hold in the region.
A photo shared by Amey NE Trunk Roads, which maintains Scotland’s trunk roads network in the northeast, showed floodwater filling streets and prompting road closures in Dundee.
Further south in Baslow, a village in Derbyshire, England, a short video showed floodwater streaming down a local road. The flooding “reveals the seriousness of today’s event,” according to the Derbyshire Dales District Council (DDDC), which posted the video on X.
Flood warnings were in effect late Friday in parts of Baslow and in several areas nearby. The DDDC directed people in the area to its online flooding resources, which include how to receive flood warnings, how to prepare for flooding and how to react in the event of a flash flood.
Newsweek reached out to the DDDC by email on Friday for comment.
Jeff J. Mitchell/Getty Images
Storm Babet began impacting parts of the UK earlier this week. Its impacts are expected to continue through the weekend.
The Met Office, which serves as the UK’s national weather service, announced on Wednesday it had issued a Red weather warning for parts of eastern Scotland in anticipation of Babet’s arrival. At the time, a Met Office spokesperson told Newsweek this kind of warning is “relatively rare” and “reserved for the most extreme weather impacts.” It was the first weather warning of its kind that officials issued for 2023. Last year, Red weather warnings were issued in connection with two extreme weather events, and only one Red warning was issued in 2021.
As Storm Babet continued impacting the region on Friday, the Met Office issued another Red weather warning, which will be in effect for eastern Scotland all day Saturday. The warning means the region’s anticipated flooding could present a “danger to life.”
Parts of Scotland recorded what would ordinarily be considered an entire month’s worth of rain in just 36 hours during Babet, weather experts said. Additional heavy rain is expected this weekend in Scotland, Wales, northern England and the Midlands, according to a Met Office news release.
As of Friday, at least two deaths had been linked to Babet in Scotland, local police told the BBC. One person was reportedly killed by a falling tree while sitting inside a vehicle, and another died after being swept into a rising river.
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.