HEAVY snow caused traffic chaos in parts of Scotland as drivers struggled with icy roads and emergency service vehicles were stranded by deep snow.
In Edinburgh a car drove through railings and crashed nose-down into the basement area outside a building after apparently skidding on ice.
The incident happened in Saxe Coburg Street at around 6.50am yesterday.
A Police Scotland spokesman said: "A Seat Leon Cupra left the road and collided with railings before coming to a stop in a basement area of a residential property.
"No one has been injured. However, the property and vehicle were damaged."
Meanwhile, a Royal Navy Sea King helicopter was drafted in to fly a one-year-old infant to hospital after a local ambulance got stuck in wintry road conditions on the way to the family's snow-bound farmhouse near Whisgills in the Scottish Borders.
A local GP, who had been able to reach the house, provided "excellent primary care" until the Sea King arrived, the Royal Navy said.
The child, who was described as "unresponsive" at the scene, was airlifted to hospital in Carlisle along with his mother, by which time his condition was said to have improved.
It came as more than 130 schools across Scotland were forced to close with the Highlands and Dumfries and Galloway worst affected - leaving youngsters free to enjoy sledging.
Nine inches of snow fell at Tulloch Bridge in Inverness-shire, the deepest accumulation in Scotland, with three inches also falling in Aviemore.
The Met Office has now downgraded its weather alert from amber to yellow, with a continued risk from snow and ice across the whole of Scotland today. The northern half of Scotland is also covered by a yellow alert for snow and ice until at least Monday, while the Central Belt, Borders and Dumfries and Galloway are expected to experience a return to milder conditions.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article