DEADLY BABET CAUSES CHAOS

Storm brings death and destruction to rural Scotland - but help is always at hand

- MARCELLO MEGA

KILLER Storm Babet inflicted more death and destruction on Scotland during an unprecedented day of chaos.

A rare "risk to life warning" was extended until midnight tonight as flood waters covered swathes of the north east.

The deadly storm has caused havoc, including:

• Three dead in separate incidents, with one man missing
• Fire and Rescue Service officers working through night and day to rescue more than 700 stranded households
• 20,000 home left without power
• Communities only accessible by boat due to extreme flooding
• Widespread travel disruption with roads, bridges and railways closed
• A month's rain falling in just 24 hours

Storm Babet brought misery to the north east when it arrived on Thursday after the "risk to life" warning was issued by the Met Office.

Tragically, the alert was all too accurate.

Within hours, a 56-year-old driver was killed after a falling tree hit a van near Forfar in Angus.

The tragedy followed the death of a 57-year-old woman who died after being swept into the Water of Lee, at Glen Esk, Angus.

The storm claimed another life yesterday when a man in his 60s was killed in Shropshire, England.

The "risk to life warning" was extended until midnight for Grampian, Tayside, Fife and Central regions as flooding covered large parts of the north-east of Scotland yesterday.

Brechin's flood defences were breached in the early hours of yesterday morning, leaving hundreds of homes cut off by floods in the epicentre of the storm.