Met Office issues rare RED weather warning - 'Danger to life' and buildings risk collapse from 'severe' floods

Britons living in Central, Tayside & Fife and Grampian are impacted by the warning.

The Met Office, who issued the warning between 6pm tomorrow and midday on Friday, said: "There is now high confidence in exceptional rainfall falling across southeast Grampian, particularly the uplands of Angus and south Aberdeenshire."

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The UK's national weather service added: "100-150 mm of rain is expected to fall widely within 24 hours with some locations likely to see 200-250 mm of rain which is expected to cause considerable impacts both where it falls and lower lying areas further east."

Aberdeenshire Council is now urging residents to take advantage of sandbags to help protect properties.

Scottish First Minister Humza Yousaf has warned against all but essential travel in areas affected by the red weather warning.

He said “Please be aware of the challenging weather we are due to experience across Scotland, most severe from Thursday 18:00 – Friday 12:00. Weather warning across Angus & the North East has been upgraded to Red. Travel should be avoided unless absolutely essential.”

He added: “The Scottish Government is working with local resilience partners, including our emergency services, to ensure we keep everyone safe & mitigate disruption as best we can.”

However, the red warning coincides with three amber warnings and three yellow warnings.

Northern Ireland faces a yellow rain warning from 2pm today until 10am tomorrow.

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Much of Scotland will also have a yellow rain warning between 6am tomorrow and 6am on Saturday.

Northern Scotland is being warned it could witness gusts of up to 65 miles per hour.

Amber rain warnings north of the border will also bring disruption.

However, the amber wind warning could make conditions even worse.

The Met Office said: "A period of very strong easterly winds, perhaps gusting in excess of 70 mph at times, will affect the coasts of Angus and Aberdeenshire for a time on Thursday.

"The combination of the very strong winds with prolonged heavy rainfall and the fact this is an unusual wind direction for winds of this strength will likely exacerbate the impacts. Large waves will be an additional hazard at the coast."

Flood warnings and alerts have already been issued across England and Scotland.

The Environment Agency put out four flood warnings and 10 flood alerts.

Nine flood alerts are currently in place north of the border, the Scottish Environment Protection Agency has said.