Thousands have been without power in Shetland for a second night as Britain’s infrastructure continues to struggle with sub-zero temperatures.
The Met Office has extended a yellow warning for snow and ice to Friday in northern Scotland and north-east England.
The Scottish government declared a major incident on Tuesday after heavy snow left thousands of homes in Shetland without power on Monday evening.
About 2,800 still have no electricity, and engineers described the “concentrated and explosive weather event” as the worst they had seen since Christmas 1995.
Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks (SSEN) was working to restore supply but it was not expected to be fully restored until the end of the week. More engineers were due to arrive in Shetland on the ferry from Aberdeen on Wednesday to help restore power.
An SSEN spokesperson, Graeme Keddie, said: “Firstly, I’d like to apologise to those customers still without power and reassure them that we are making every effort to get to them.”
He told BBC Radio Scotland’s Good Morning Scotland that the company had reconnected 1,000 homes on Tuesday and continued to make progress. “We’ve got 15 additional line crews coming over on this morning’s freight ferry and more by helicopter, so that will make a real difference to restoration efforts,” he said.
“This has been a very concentrated and explosive weather event on Shetland which was far more severe than forecast. The local teams have said this is the worst they’ve seen since 1995 over the Christmas period.”
Snow and ice have been causing disruption on the roads since the start of the week. The RAC breakdown service recorded its busiest day on record on Monday, going to the assistance of about 12,000 drivers.
Yesterday was officially our busiest day for breakdowns on record, with around 12,000 drivers needing help 🤯
— The RAC (@TheRAC_UK) December 13, 2022
A huge thank you to all our colleagues, especially our patrols braving the challenging weather ❄️ pic.twitter.com/10iWgyCpA8
Braemar in Aberdeenshire was the coldest place in the UK for the second night in a row on Tuesday, recording a temperature of -17.3C.
The Met Office said on Twitter: “It will be another cold start this Wednesday morning with warnings for snow, ice and strong winds active across the UK.”
The Met Office spokesperson Becky White said: “There will be a risk of ice across the country over the next few days, but particularly tonight.”
Commenting on the latest yellow warning in northern Scotland and north-east England, White said some areas could see up to 10cm of fresh snow on higher ground, with 1-4cm at lower levels.
It will be another cold start this Wednesday morning with warnings ⚠️ for #snow, ice and strong winds active across the UK
— Met Office (@metoffice) December 13, 2022
Here is the latest forecast 👇 pic.twitter.com/eY3KaxzZlc
In Sheffield, engineers reported that they still had just over 100 households left to reconnect to gas on Tuesday evening. Nearly 2,000 homes in the city lost supplies 11 days earlier when a burst water main filled the local gas network with more than a million litres of water.
Snow and ice warnings were in place in the south-west of England until 10am on Wednesday. The region could see as much as 10cm of snow on higher ground such as Dartmoor and Exmoor.
Ice warnings were also in place in for eastern England and northern parts of Northern Ireland, including Belfast, until midday on Wednesday.
