On Saturday Diary of a major storm... so far, so good

17:00 Thursday: I am going to attempt writing the diary of a storm - and do so because never before have we been treated to so much in the way of meteorological expectation and concern.

Of course, as I write we have no real way of telling what will have happened by the time this is printed and being read across the South West.

Between my tapping away and Saturday morning, Storm Eunice, predicted to be one of the worst Atlantic lows in living memory, will have blown through.

The Met Office has just declared a rare red-weather-warning – and where I live not far from the West Somerset coast – is bang in the middle of the most threatened zone.

Of course, these things don’t always pan-out the way meteorologists predict. We all remember poor old Michael Fish and the storm of 1987. Because of that, it’s often said that forecasters prefer to announce the worse – woe-betide the windblown weatherman who fails to shout: “Baton down the hatches.”

As I write, someone on national radio tells householders in the South West to tie down or put away anything in the garden that might later come whistling through the windows like an Exocet missile.

And now I am emailed a warning by Western Power Distribution. It is the first missive of its kind I have ever received and just about guarantees our electricity will be knocked out.

It adds, extra staff are being taken on as they get ready to cope. “Helicopters will be available to fly and identify badly affected areas to hasten repairs if safe to do so from first light, ” it adds, which makes me feel something big really is afoot.

Unless, of course, it is an M Fish moment in reverse.

07:00 Friday. Which it might be… Not a breath of wind here deep in the valley. Yet.

09:00 Friday. Hang on. And I mean hang on. A strong wind is now buffeting the loft space where I work.

There is a bit of me that turns into a little boy when a great storm is in the offing. It’s the excited bit – awed by the power of nature – the same bit which loves to go to the coast after an almighty gale to watch giant waves. This character trait is joined by another bit which likes lighting a log fire to snuggle up warm and cosy while the whole outdoors is running absolutely wild.

But then there’s the memory of a previous storm many years ago when I was on duty as a reporter for the BBC. I was driving a radio car across a bridge on the outskirts of Taunton, trying my best to belt around and cover as many incidents as I could, when the vehicle was lifted by the wind and thrown towards the parapet and the 50 foot drop on the other side.

Luckily, the gust dropped the car on the pavement and I continued with a beating heart realising that I was very nearly the news story myself.

It was enough to send me straight back to the studio in the centre of town where I continued my investigations on foot. An act which was no less dangerous. As I left a sheltered alley and entered the main-street and a flying dustbin lid came very close to taking off my head.

It was a busy day. Local radio comes into its own when the power to drive televisions or computers fails and the only means of picking up any news is through a batterypowered transistor set. I worked long into the night, broadcasting reports of road-closures and the like.

Then, when the storm died down, I recall driving the 20 miles home through utter darkness. With the entire county out of power, you could occasionally glimpse a lantern light flickering from a distant farmhouse window, but nothing else.

It was like driving back through time – through the unelectrified Westcountry of the 18th century.

11:00 Friday: I am becoming increasingly aware that I might not be able to finish this diary - and that Western Power Distribution might be right.

This computer needs electricity and so does the router that will send it to the papers.

Not for the first time, I realise that modern civilisation is but a thin veneer.

It doesn’t take much to throw us, quite literally, back into the Dark Ages. I remember thinking it when the fuel tanker drivers went on strike and the whole region ground to a halt. I have thought it during blizzards and I have certainly witnessed it during major Atlantic storms.

“What’s he on about?” I hear you say. “We’ve got our mobile phones nowadays so we can never be cut off.”

Try using one during a major power cut when an entire large area is off-grid. Your smartphone will be about as knowledgeable as a warthog with a hangover. They don’t work when the local phone mast loses power.

12:00 Friday. No, when the wind blows very hard, the world can be a lonely place. All I can hope is that we all stay safe. The wind hitting my loft is the worst I can remember - it is time to press ‘send’ while I still can.

‘Modern civilisation is a thin veneer. It doesn’t take much to throw us back to the Dark Ages’