Storm Eowyn (1)

This morning we were awakened by the first sounds of a rising wind - the arrival of Storm Eowyn which had been much heralded during the week including , yesterday evening, by the first mass texting by the Scottish & UK Governments (which features in my extra photos).  

At 8.15 with the wind now at gale force the power went off.   We hunkered down in the lounge, which is the most sheltered room, worried as ever about the conservatory even though most wind directions  sweep over the "meadow between two hills" which is the colloquial Gaelic meaning of the place name, Feorlean.

The bird table was the first casualty, however, split in half by a particularly noisy gust. 

Mid afternoon, between torrential showers, we  then noticed that a line of trees had fallen behind the house, but when we went out to take a look, the storm was just too great to stand against.   

Shortly afterwards we lost our water supply and then within an hour the mobile signal went too. 

It was well into the the evening when the gale started to subside making Storm Eowyn the most intense and longest lasting storm we had experienced in our 32 years here , and certainly ever bit as bad as the very worst we had lived through when we were in the Western Isles. The only one that compared with it was the early January storm in 2012 ( which also had a red warning) but it was of much shorter duration.

Fortunately we have a wood burning stove on which we can also boil water, but when we went to bed there was still no power and the last glimpse we had had of the SSEN map of outages  before we lost signal was indicating that we might be without power for some considerable time.

(Back blipped 27/01/25)