LONDON — A powerful storm is expected to lash southwestern Britain starting Thursday night, after a month that has brought a series of extreme weather events to the country.
The storm, named Evert, “is forecast to bring unseasonably strong winds and heavy rain to southern parts of the U.K. later today and into Friday,” the Met Office, Britain’s national meteorological service, said on Twitter. Wind gusts of up to 75 miles per hour are expected.
The Met Office’s severe weather warning system is divided into three levels: Yellow for low-level impacts; amber for travel delays, road and rail closures, power cuts, and potential risk to life and property; and red, the most dangerous of all.
An amber wind warning will be in place from Thursday night until Friday morning for much of Cornwall, in southwestern England, as well as the Isles of Scilly off the Cornish coast. Yellow warnings are also in place for the wider southwest, southern Wales and along the southern coast of England.
In 2015, the Met Office and Met Éireann, Ireland’s national meteorological service, began naming storms in an effort to improve communication about them and to raise awareness. Storms are named when they meet the criteria for an amber or red warning level, based on the threat posed by the storm.
Evert is the third named storm to strike Britain this year. In January, Christoph brought wind, rain and flooding across Wales and Manchester, England. The next month, Darcy caused widespread travel disruptions with heavy snowstorms and subfreezing temperatures across the country.
Evert comes after torrential rain caused flash flooding in parts of London twice in recent weeks, most recently on Sunday. A fierce heat wave this month also prompted the Met Office to issue its first-ever extreme heat warning.
Extreme weather events are becoming more common in a warming world. A summer heat wave this month saw Northern Ireland hit its highest temperature on record.
“That’s part of a pattern of our warming climate,” said Dr. Mark McCarthy, a climate information scientist at the Met Office, who added, “The warmer atmosphere in changing climate is also likely to increase the risk of really intense summer rainfall events.”
