Disruption as gusts of nearly 70mph hit area

Large swathes of Scotland and England were subject to a yellow weather warning for wind from the Met Office for most of the day, with the strongest gusts arriving overnight.

The Tay Road Bridge saw gusts as strong as 68mph early today.

That meant several restrictions were put in place on the road, with the speed limit cut to 30mph and the bridge closed to motorcyclists, double decker buses, high-sided vehicles and pedestrians.

Only cars and single-decker buses could travel across. The Met Office said that the winds were due to die down later in the day, though the region will remain blustery for a time.

A spokesman told the Tele: “The high winds will continue throughout the day before slowly dying down during the night and into the morning.

“It will stay quite windy later but we will not see as strong winds as we had earlier.

“Higher winds will continue over the more northern parts of Scotland and the Northern Isles.”

The Met Office’s yellow warning meant that some areas could see disruption to public transport and cuts to power supplies.

Although no such issues were reported in Dundee, ScotRail said it was monitoring the weather closely in case of any issues on its lines.

Meanwhile, drivers heading towards the city faced long tailbacks on the A914 near Drumoig.

A tree was blown down on a bend on the route, forcing motorists to drive on to the other side of the road to get past.

The incident meant that route 99 Stagecoach bus services heading into Dundee were being diverted for a time.

Dundee is expected to experience windy conditions for most of the rest of the week.

Gusts of up to 30mph are expected tomorrow, with wind speeds topping 35mph on Wednesday — although both days should stay fairly dry with conditions forecast to be overcast, with a 50% chance of rain on Wednesday morning.

Similar conditions are expected on Thursday and Friday, though temperatures will only hit 12C on Friday dipping to 7C overnight.

The forecast suggests that by the weekend, winds will have subsided slightly, with cloud cover expected throughout Saturday and Sunday with temperatures of 14C during the day.

TAYSIDE and Fife faced disruption today as winds of up to 70mph battered the region.

Signs near the Tay Road Bridge today warning drivers that there were restrictions in place due to the weather.

A tree on the road near Drumoig.