Storm Ashley to batter Scotland with strong winds in first named storm of season

Met Éireann have named the system coming through on Sunday as Storm Ashley, our first named storm of the new season which began at the start of September.

By this time last year, we had already seen Storm Agnes and Storm Babet.

Throughout Friday, we have an initial low pressure system moving through bringing with it wet and windy conditions. The band of rain will clear eastwards tonight and makes way for what will actually be a relatively fine and dry Saturday to start the weekend.

However, during Saturday night, Storm Ashley crossed the jet stream, so the relatively slack low-pressure system that it begins life as will move across what is essentially a 200mph wind stream. As it does this, it goes through what is called explosive cyclogenesis (or a “weather bomb”). This means the low pressure deepens rapidly into an extremely deep area of low pressure—aka Storm Ashley.

The isobars around the center of Storm Ashley tighten throughout Saturday night and therefore it will bring very strong winds to Scotland on Sunday. Combined with this we have very high spring tides that will likely lead to some flooding and the risk of coastal flooding due to storm surge as the strong winds associated with Storm Ashley will push water onshore at roughly the same time as high tide.

Sunday will be windy wherever you are, with the strongest gusts and highest chance of gales occurring around the north and northwest. Two weather warnings have already been issued.

An amber wind warning covering the Western Isles, parts of Caithness and Sutherland and parts of Argyll and Bute will run from 9am Sunday until midnight. Within this area, we expect to see gusts of between 70-80mph.

Meanwhile a yellow wind weather warning covers the whole of Scotland, coming into effect from 3am on Sunday until midnight and within this area, we expect to see gusts of 50-60mph quite widely.

Come Monday, Storm Ashley will begin to clear and after a windy start to the day, it will be an improving picture without any damaging winds that may disrupt the clean-up effort after the storm.