Heavy rainfall caused flooding, transport disruption and the cancellation of events across many parts of Scotland over the weekend with a warning of more to come.
An amber weather warning – the second highest – was in place between Saturday evening and Sunday afternoon for parts of north-east Scotland, while a yellow warning was in place for much of northern Scotland.
The Scottish Environment Protection Agency had more than 50 flood warnings in place while a severe flood warning was active for the Aviemore and Dalfaber areas.
Vincent Fitzsimons, Sepa’s flood duty manager, described it as a “major weather event” and urged people to “stay alert, not stand down”.
He said: “It’s been a rough weekend across Scotland, with severe weather causing widespread travel disruption to road and rail networks and impacts in communities from Greenock to Aviemore.”
On Saturday, 10 people were airlifted by coastguard helicopter from their vehicles after landslides closed the A83 in Argyll and Bute.
The area at the Rest and Be Thankful stretch of the A83, one of Scotland’s most famous tourist roads, had a month’s worth of rain – about 160mm – fall over 36 hours.
The roads management firm Bear Scotland said it was unlikely the road would reopen on Sunday.
Ian Stewart, Bear Scotland’s north-west representative, said: “This extreme weather has caused widespread disruption, with Argyll significantly affected. Our teams are beginning clear-up operations to return full access to residents of Argyll, but conditions are still difficult, and we need to ensure that those on site are safe.”
Police Scotland asked people to avoid all unnecessary travel.
The Met Office said Tyndrum, a village in west Perthshire, experienced the most rainfall (112.6mm).
Among the sporting events abandoned on Sunday were the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship, which this year had celebrity participants including Bill Murray and Catherine Zeta-Jones, with waterlogging at its three golf courses.
Although the rain was due to ease off on Sunday afternoon, there were warnings that the threat of flooding – particularly on the River Spey and the River Tay – would remain for longer.
A further yellow weather warning was issued by the Met Office for between 6am and 9pm on Tuesday for the west coast of Scotland. It stressed that the heavy rain would be “nothing like the amount seen on Saturday” but said there was still a chance of flooding and transport disruption.
In stark contrast, the south of England on Sunday experienced sunshine and temperature highs of 27C (80.6F).
Tom Morgan, a Met Office meteorologist, said the contrasting weather was caused by warm weather travelling up from France meeting cold weather coming from the north, with the temperature contrast leading to the heavy rain in Scotland.
The warm weather in southern parts was expected to last until Tuesday.
