Heavy snow expected as two yellow weather warnings issued

Scots are set to wake up to wintry weather conditions as two weather warnings for snow have been put in place.

On Thursday, the Met Office issued two yellow alerts for snow across the country.

A warning was put in place for parts of the central belt, the Scottish Borders and Strathclyde from 4am until 3pm.

Meanwhile a second alert for snow was put in place across Grampian, Tayside, the Highlands and parts of the west coast until 9am on Friday.

Heavy rainfall has also affected parts of the country, with motorists warned to drive with care as surface water affects roads.

Gritters have been deployed to treat roads across the country.

STV meteorologist Sean Batty said: “The initial risk overnight and into Thursday morning will be across central and southern Scotland, although mainly above 200 metres.

“At higher levels here there could be a few centimetres of snow by Thursday morning, for the likes of Peebles, Moffat, Wanlockhead, Lanark and East Kilbride.

“So a spell of snow is likely on the higher parts of the M74, A71 and possibly the highest parts of the M77 and M8 for a time.

“I reckon the most disruptive snow will be as this whole system drifts north of the central belt, across the Highlands, Perthshire, west Aberdeenshire, northern Stirlingshire and eastern Argyll where as much as 20cm could settle by Friday morning above 200 metres.

“This could lead to road closure, with roads such as the A9, A95, A96 and A939 at risk of some awful conditions for a time.

“If we get as much as 20cm by Friday morning in some of our higher villages there is a potential for them to be cut off as local roads become impassible.

“The mix of rain and hill snow will ease into Friday to leave much brighter and drier conditions for the weekend, although we should expect some very low temperatures at night with lows of -15C possible in the Highlands.

“While this spell of cold weather has for the most part not been overly severe, it’s lasted for a good while now.

“I’ve been looking through the stats for winter so far and somewhere in Scotland has reported a low of -5C or lower on 24 nights so far this winter, which is the most we’ve had since the severe cold of winter 2010/11.

“We will continue to see this battle between warm and cold air well into February, and with severe cold setting in over Scandinavia in the coming weeks, this will need close watching as an easterly air flow would bring it our way.”