South Lanarkshire escapes bashing from hurricane winds

Dec 15 2011 by Leona Greenan, Hamilton Advertiser

South Lanarkshire escapes bashing from hurricane winds

SOUTH Lanarkshire escaped largely unscathed after hurricane winds battered the county last Thursday.

Fears of widespread structural damage proved unfounded as the storm raged from noon until 9pm that evening with winds approaching up to 100mph.

Residents of Balmore Drive, Meikle Earnock, were left shocked when part of a roof on a block of flats was torn off during the worst of the winds. South Lanarkshire Council have since been out to repair the damage.

But Hamilton and the surrounding area seems to have faired better with most of the damage limited to felled trees, including community Christmas trees, large branches partially blocking roads, and blocked gullies.

The worst area in Lanarkshire affected, however, appeared to be in Hamilton Road, Bellshill, where part of a building was demolished by the high winds.

That area of road remains closed to motorists whilst the council remove debris.

A spokeswoman for North Lanarkshire Council said: “Hamilton Road remains closed to traffic at present while the council’s building standards team remove debris and stabilise the building damaged during last week’s storms. A pedestrian walkway is in place. At present we expect the road to reopen in the near future, however drivers should be aware that the scaffolding will slightly encroach on one side and take extra care when passing it. We will provide updates through our website and on our twitter feed @nlcpeople.”

It was suggested that North Lanarkshire received the worst bashing with the epicentre of the storm hitting the area at around 3pm.

Earlier that day Strathclyde Police issued a warning to the public on Thursday not to travel between the hours of 2pm and 9pm when the “extremely dangerous” storm was at its peak.

All schools and nurseries across South Lanarkshire were closed and many Hamilton-based workers were sent home for the day as businesses were forced to close early. All establishments did, however, reopen as normal on Friday morning.

The storm also caused widespread disruption to public transport on both roads and railways.

Commuters faced lengthy delays as bus firms across West Scotland scaled back services and train journeys were delayed or cancelled.

Council workers were out in force across Lanarkshire assessing the damage and dealing with repairs on Friday.

It is also expected that any school prelims missed on Thursday will be rescheduled.

A South Lanarkshire Council spokesman said: “We’ve escaped significant snowfall and temperatures in the countryside areas were marginally below zero and in urban areas above freezing. We had no reports of significant flooding of residential properties. There were no major road closures although we have responded to numerous localised flooding incidents due to blocked gullies.

“These were dealt with as quickly as possible and overall there was no major disruption caused by the stormy weather.”