London:

Tens of thousands of homes across the UK were left without power on Saturday and two people were killed after Storm Darragh hit the country with strong winds and caused pre-Christmas travel disruption.

Darragh, the fourth named storm of the season, is also expected to bring heavy rain through the weekend, with the UK’s Environment Agency issuing dozens of flood warnings.

Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds told Sky News on Saturday the storm posed a “challenging situation”.

Two men were killed as a result of trees falling on their cars in separate incidents in Lancashire, northwest England, and in the west Midlands.

In Wales, the Met Office estimated gusts of up to 150 kilometres per hour (93 miles per hour), with a “major incident” declared in parts of Wales due to the extensive disruption.

The storm has had “very significant effects in many parts of Wales, including on transport, energy infrastructure and property”, the Welsh devolved leader said in a statement, warning that the effects could be “felt for some days yet”.

As of Saturday afternoon 177,000 homes in England, Scotland and Wales were without power, according to the Energy Networks Association.

Trains were disrupted or suspended on several routes including from Glasgow to Edinburgh in Scotland, and between Cambridge and Stansted Airport in eastern England.  

Rail operator CrossCountry, which operates nationwide, put a “do not travel” notice in place for Saturday due to cancellations and severe delays. 

Network Rail Wales suspended trains on the Welsh northern coast due to a “fallen tree blocking the line”, and several bridges in southern England and Wales were closed for safety reasons.

In Northern Ireland, thousands were left without power, and several bus and train services were suspended or delayed.

Christmas markets and sporting events were postponed, including the Merseyside derby between Premier League leaders Liverpool and Everton.

In Ireland, which issued an “orange” wind warning, 175,000 homes were without electricity as of Saturday evening, according to ESB Networks, which said there was “widespread and extensive damage to electricity infrastructure”.

Dublin Airport said “a number of flights scheduled for Saturday morning have been cancelled by airlines” due to the storm.

Darragh comes two weeks after Storm Bert battered much of Britain, causing “devastating” flooding in parts of Wales and knocking out power to thousands of homes in Ireland.

The UK’s Met Office had issued a rare red alert for high winds overnight to Saturday morning (0300 to 1100 GMT) covering parts of Wales and southwest England.

A separate amber warning, which is less serious than the red alert but still flags a “potential risk to life and property”, covering a larger stretch of the UK and Northern Ireland is in place until Saturday night.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Manila:

Rescuers in the Philippines were diving into a lake and scouring isolated villages on Sunday to locate dozens of missing people as the death count from Tropical Storm Trami hit 100.

Trami, which rammed into the Philippines on October 24, was among the deadliest storms to hit the Southeast Asian country this year.

According to the national disaster agency, it forced more than half a million people to flee their homes and at least 36 people remain missing.

Police in the hardest-hit Bicol region have recorded 38 deaths, most due to drowning. 

“We are still receiving many calls and we are trying to save as many people as we can,” Bicol regional police director Andre Dizon told AFP.

“Hopefully, there will be no more deaths.”

Dizon added that “many residents” in the region’s Camarines Sur province are still trapped on roofs and the upper floors of their homes.  

The death count in Batangas, south of Manila, has risen to 55, provincial police chief Jacinto Malinao told AFP. 

Two were reported dead in separate incidents of electrocution and drowning in Cavite province, police said.

Five more bodies were recovered in other provinces, bringing the total to 100, according to an AFP tally based on official police and disaster agency sources.

“A higher death toll is possible in the coming days since rescuers can now reach previously isolated places,” Edgar Posadas of the Civil Defence Office told AFP. 

The police, coast guards and a Marines diving team were searching on Sunday for a family of seven at Taal Lake in Batangas. 

“The waters from the mountains hit their home in Balete town, causing it to be swept away with them possibly inside,” Malinao, the provincial police chief, said.

Most of the deaths in Batangas have been attributed to rain-induced landslides. 

More than 20 bodies were pulled from heaps of mud, boulders and fallen trees, while police said at least another 20 people in the province are still missing.

“We will continue searching until all bodies are retrieved,” Malinao said. 

The national disaster agency said Sunday that about 560,000 people had been displaced by floods, which submerged hundreds of villages in swaths of the northern Philippines.

About 20 big storms and typhoons hit the archipelago nation or its surrounding waters each year, damaging homes and infrastructure and killing dozens of people.

A recent study showed that storms in the Asia-Pacific region are increasingly forming closer to coastlines, intensifying more rapidly and lasting longer over land due to climate change.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)