Two people killed as Storm Darragh brings chaos to many parts of the country

A cleanup operation is underway as communities survey the damage brought by Storm Darragh, which killed two people over the weekend.

- Robyn Vinter

Yesterday evening brought an end to severe weather warnings for wind and rain that had been in place since Friday. The weather caused chaos on roads and rail in many parts of the country, as well as severe flooding.

On Saturday morning, a man in his 40s was killed when a tree fell on his van on the A59 at Longton, near Preston, while a second man died at about 3pm when a tree fell on his car in Erdington, Birmingham.

At 3am, a bus driver was taken to hospital after his Translink airport express bus left the road and hit a wall near Antrim in Northern Ireland.

There were gusts of nearly 100mph in parts of the country on Saturday and more than a quarter of a million people were left without power in the west of England and Wales.

While 91% of the homes suffering power outages had been reconnected as of 2pm on Sunday, there were still 161,000 without power, the Energy Networks Association said.

The rail network was hit by delays and cancellations, with Southeastern and Thameslink services particularly badly affected and all lines closed between Wolverhampton and Stafford because of a tree blocking the line.