How bad is Storm Eunice – and is it a result of climate breakdown?

A significant threat to life is being warned of by the forecasters as the storm is battering parts of the UK. Can we expect an increase in disruptive storms due to climate breakdown?

Where has the storm come from?

The Azores were spun up from the central Atlantic by the jet stream.

Is it a particularly bad storm?

The Needles lighthouse on the Isle of Wight has recorded gusts of over 100mph. This surpasses the prediction of 90mph winds, and is just under the record 120mph winds that hit during the storm of 1987, which killed 18 people.

The Met Office says that the storm could be the worst since then. The Met Office has issued a red alert and asked people to stay at home. The government has convened a meeting.

The Met Office red and amber warnings for high winds should not be taken lightly, according to Prof Hannah Cloke. There is an imminent danger to life and you need to act now. Everyone who lives or works in those areas should be taking precautions to protect their homes and businesses.

Let us be clear about what this means. Cars and buildings can be crushed by winds of 70mph. They can pick up roof tiles. If you are hit by one of them you will die. People and vehicles will be swept off the streets by the strong wind. Don't take any chances. Stay inside.

There is talk of a deadly ‘sting jet’ coming with the storm, but what is that?

Scientists at the Met Office said one of these can happen. There were small areas of very intense winds within a storm that were hard to predict, according to a research scientist at the University of Exeter.

They are about 10 km wide and can be caused by specific instabilities within the flight lines of storms.

They are not a feature of all storms. They are often just a feature of the most intense ones. It's difficult to forecast them because they are small scale and can have high wind speeds.

Is Eunice linked to climate breakdown?

Michael Dukes said it could be. Climate models show an increase in these types of storms as the earth continues to warm. Climate scientists have been warning us about this for a long time.

Most scientists agree that the climate crisis will make the storms worse, even though they disagree about whether the storms are likely to increase and become stronger.

Friederike Otto, who leads the World Weather Attribution service, said there was no evidence that climate change had made storms stronger.

She said that the damages of winter storms have gotten worse because of human-caused climate change, and that many studies link this to climate change.

Richard Allan, a professor of climate science at the University of Reading, said that once-in-a-decade storms like Eunice are certain to batter the British Isles in the future but there is no compelling evidence that they will become more frequent or potent.

With more intense rain and higher sea levels as human-caused climate change continues to heat the planet, flooding from coastal storm surge and lengthy deluges will only get worse.