View across the Outer Harbour of Stornoway

Monday 2 November 2009

Monday 2 November

Bright and sunny this morning with some light showers. Over on the east coast of Scotland, they have more than just a few light showers: flooding up to 4 feet deep is affecting towns from Inverness to Aberdeen to Dundee. Arbroath is cut off by flood water, Stonehaven and Aberdeen, further north, affected by floodwaters. The rain has moved away into the North Sea. The weather charts indicate that a low pressure system will take up residence over northern Scotland this week. The result will be reasonable weather here in the northwest, but awful elsewhere.

The proposed windfarms in southeast Lewis are in serious jeopardy today, after it appeared that European Union regulations on protected species could be invoked. These regulations stipulate that any area, housing golden and sea eagles, should be regarded as a species protected area, even if the area is not currently subject to such a designation. This ruling was used to turn down a windfarm application for a site near Inveraray, Argyll, which had 10 times fewer eagles than are around in Lochs.