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Eunice, as the storm is called, landed in the southwest of Ireland in the predawn hours, leaving tens of thousands without power, before barreling across to Britain.
A man in Ireland, a council worker in his 60s, was killed by a falling tree. Irish broadcaster RTE said that the storm knocked out power to 80,000 homes and businesses in the country. In England, the areas of Cornwall and Devon were also reporting power outages.
The Met Office weather service issued not one, but two rare “red” weather warnings — the highest possible level — for Wales and parts of southern England, including London. It was the first time the British capital had received such a warning since the system was introduced in 2011.
According to the U.K. Met Office, the Needles on the Isle of Wight clocked a gust of 122 mph, “provisionally the highest gust ever recorded in England.” The Needles are a series of chalk landforms over the English Channel and home to a lighthouse in southernmost England.
In one dramatic scene, the roof of London’s O2 arena was ripped open by the winds.
The O2, a major multipurpose venue popular for music concerts, hasn’t commented on its partially missing roof, but in a message on its website, it said that a concert by the Fugees scheduled for Friday evening had been canceled.
This may not have come as a surprise to anyone watching videos posted by one social media user with a view of the arena showing panel after panel tearing away.
Assessing how much damage Eunice has brought will take time. But by early Friday, the storm had caused widespread travel problems. All trains in Wales were suspended. Train operators across the rest of the country warned of disruptions and several services were operating with a speed limit of 50 miles per hour.
Hundreds of flights were canceled or delayed as they were buffeted by intense winds. While the highest gusts were found along the coast in both Ireland and the United Kingdom, London’s Heathrow Airport recorded a 70 mph gust.
Viewers at home could watch planes landing — or trying to land — at Heathrow compliments of Jerry Dyer, an aviation enthusiast who broadcasts Big Jet TV on YouTube.
Dyer was narrating live from the airport, with the camera focused on planes as they attempted to land.
Not all of the planes made their landings. Some had multiple misses and had to go around and try again. Dyer’s footage was both mesmerizing and nail-biting. As the planes came in, Dyer could be heard making comments like, “Oh, no, he’s off center!” and “Qatar’s third attempt folks, here we go!” and “Okay, this guy is coming in sideways.”
His channel quickly went viral, with more than 200,000 people tuning in.
Others on social media shared images and footage of flying objects and falling debris. One user appeared rather surprised when he captured the moment that a giant tree toppled over in the middle of a seaside town. The country was only starting to recover from a separate storm, named Dudley, earlier in the week.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s office said that COBRA, the government’s crisis committee, would meet Friday afternoon amid reports that Eunice could be one of the most intense windstorms in decades. London Mayor Sadiq Khan urged people to “stay at home” and “not take risks.”
A number of attractions, including the London Eye, a Ferris wheel on the Thames River, and Legoland, a theme park based in Windsor, closed on Friday as a precaution. Some zoos and parks also closed.
The destructive gusts were brought on by a phenomenon known as a sting jet which, according to the U.K. Met Office, “is a core of strong winds which sometimes forms in rapidly deepening areas of low pressure and extends towards the ground.”
Strong temperature contrasts help strengthen these jets, and the power of Friday’s storm can be traced to the collision of abnormally warm air over western Europe and frigid air over the North Atlantic.
Climate change may have also played a role in Eunice’s strength. An October study published in the journal Climate Dynamics concluded that in a warming world, “the frequency of extreme windstorms in Europe is projected to increase by 2100 and a large contribution comes from sting jet storms.”
However, some scientists are not convinced about a strong link between climate change and storms like Eunice.
“Once in a decade storms like Eunice are certain to batter the British Isles in the future, but there is no compelling evidence that they will become more frequent or potent in terms of wind speeds,” said Richard Allan, professor of climate science at the University of Reading.
He added, however, that a moister atmosphere in a warmer climate “could make storms more potent” in a tweet, while stating: “More intense rainfall due to the extra moisture and worse coastal flooding due to higher sea levels is more certain effect of #climate change on storms.”
In addition to the high winds, Eunice also brought heavy rain and snow to parts of Ireland and the U.K.
Severe flood warnings were issued for waterways in Gloucestershire, England, which is about 90 miles northwest of London.
Eunice intensified at breakneck speed before it slammed into the British Isle, meeting the meteorological criteria of a “bomb cyclone,” Met Éireann tweeted.
As of Friday afternoon local time, the red weather warnings had expired in Ireland and the U.K. as the worst of the winds had eased. But the Met Office urged caution through the evening with “significant disruption” still possible, particularly in Wales where an amber weather warning remained in effect.
The storm is next set to sweep through mainland Europe into Saturday. Northern parts of the Netherlands, northern Germany, Denmark and Sweden may be hard hit before the storm crosses the Baltic Sea and slams into Eastern Europe.
Samenow reported from Washington.
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