Met Office weather forecast: Thunderstorm warning for London as wildfires break out on 'Furnace Friday'

A yellow alert has been issued for thunderstorms in London (file image)
London News Pictures/REX
Alexandra Richards27 July 2018

London and the east of England are on alert for torrential thunderstorms today after a series of wildfires broke out on what has been dubbed “Furnace Friday.”

The Met Office has issued a yellow weather warning for storms in London and eastern parts of the country from 2pm onwards on Friday.

Motorists were told to expect lightning, flash flooding and large hailstones on Friday as the sizzling heat triggered the thunderstorms.

Network rail anticipated widespread disruption on rail routes after lightning struck a signal box in York controlling the signalling system for Leeds and York.

The train company Northern also warned passengers “not to travel” due to the severe infrastructure failure which has caused mass timetable disruption in the north of England.

@samueltwilkinson /PA

The company also warned that train services in the south were affected by the lightning strike with timetable delays to be expected on services between Kings Cross and Leeds.

UK Heatwave - In pictures

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The stormy weather is expected to continue into the weekend with the entire country set to endure wet and windy conditions on Sunday.

The break in the heatwave follows weeks of scorching weather in the UK which has caused officials to issue health and safety warnings.

On Friday morning soaring temperatures caused a mountain to catch fire in Llangollen, Wales.

Police advised people to avoid the area as fire crews attempted to stop the blaze.

A man drowned and two teenagers were missing after going swimming on the hottest day of the year.

The body of the man, thought to be in his twenties, was recovered from the Jubilee river in Slough after police were alerted last night.

Coastguards this morning resumed the search for a 14-year-old boy last seen swimming with a friend off Clacton pier in Essex. The friend was rescued by a lifeboat.

'Mother of all thunderstorms'

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Meanwhile, police in Warwickshire were searching for a 17-year-old who disappeared in a lake. It came as temperatures peaked at 35C last night, making it the hottest day of the year. The heatwave continued to cause havoc for commuters and holidaymakers. Problems included:

Delays of up to three hours on Le Shuttle services from Folkestone after faulty air-conditioning put carriages out of action.

Long queues at St Pancras for Eurostar passengers.

London Fire Brigade requested a temporary ban on barbecues in parks after a record number of grass fires.

Hyde Parks Serpentine Lido extremely busy and hot in Hyde Park on Friday
Jeremy Selwyn

Delays on trains in and out of Liverpool Street due to problems with overhead lines.

A warning of thunderstorms and flash floods with temperatures forecast to soar to 37C later today.

The boy missing in the sea at Clacton was named by his family as Ben Quartermaine from the town. One witness said: “Pier staff were trying to throw life-rings out into the water but I could only see that one lad could get hold. The current seemed to have them. It was horrible to see.” Another onlooker said: “After a couple of failed attempts they got it to him, and he kept hold of the other end of the rope as the current took him under the pier. They saved his life.”

Essex police said emergency services were called about 6.35pm. One boy was rescued by a lifeboat and reunited with his family.

“A search commenced for the second boy, which continued into the hours of darkness and has been resumed by the HM Coastguard this morning,” the force said.

Thames Valley police said the death of the man whose body was recovered was not being treated as suspicious. He was thought to have fallen from a weir. Warwickshire police remained at a lake in a quarry in Bishops Itchington following a report of the 17-year-old boy going into the water yesterday evening.

Problems were caused at Eurotunnel when the air conditioning system on its trains, which carry cars, coaches and HGVs, was unable to cope with “extreme temperatures”. This prompted Eurotunnel to cancel thousands of tickets on one of the busiest weeks of the year for cross-Channel travel, due to the start of many school summer holidays.

The firm took the “unprecedented decision” to stop passengers from travelling today. By mid-morning, queues to check-in had been reduced to 30 minutes, but with a further 90-minute wait before passengers were able to drive on to the Shuttle trains.

Eurotunnel said: “The prolonged and unprecedented temperatures in the South-East of England are affecting the air conditioning on board our shuttles. Due to the high level of traffic booked, we are currently unable to check-in any customers arriving more than two hours before their booked crossing time. We strongly recommend that you stock up with water and take a comfort break prior to arriving at our Folkestone Terminal.”

At St Pancras, thousands of Eurostar passengers queued amid fears that services would suffer knock-on disruption. From 7am a huge queue snaked around the station with one staff member saying “I have never seen it like this before”.

Mary and Carly Weingard, from the US, arrived for their 8.31am service to Amsterdam more than two hours before departure. Ms Weingard said: “We saw about problems yesterday at Folkestone and so got here really early. The queues are amazingly long we didn’t think it would be this bad.”

Connor Mitchell was heading to Disneyland Paris with his six-year-old son. He said: “It all looks ok but we are sweltering in this queue. It’s a holiday of a lifetime for my son. We need to make it there. When we watched the news yesterday we feared the worst.”

Thousands of Eurostar passengers queue at St Pancras( Jeremy Selwyn)
Jeremy Selwyn

London Fire Brigade commissioner Dany Cotton today wrote to all London councils requesting a temporary ban on barbecues in public parks after a record-breaking number of grass fires. Yesterday firefighters battled grass fires in Walthamstow, Beckton, West Wickham and Beckenham – where eight hectares of grass and woodland caught fire.

Dozens of customers at Thorpe Park near Staines were yesterday left dangling at the top of a 115ft ride for an hour after a power cut hit the theme park. Thorpe Park said customers would be able to return for free. Eurostar faces further problems tomorrow when about 150 staff at St Pancras, including ticket inspectors, take part in a 24-hour RMT walk-out over working conditions. The union says its St Pancras staff are working in “shocking and dangerous” conditions resulting from “repeated failures and delays” of the Eurostar service.

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