SEVERE weather is causing delays to rail passengers across the Highlands today - as a key road remains out of action.
ScotRail has warned for delays and alterations services across a series of services included the world-famous West Highland Line, and the Highland Main Line because of heavy rain.
Delays are expected till the end of the day on services between Edinburgh and Inverness, Inverness and Kyle of Lochalsh, Glasgow and Inverness, Glasgow and Mallaig, Glasgow and Oban, Inverness and Wick.
"Because of forecast severe weather we are expecting services across Scotland to be affected," said a ScotRail spokesman, adding that speed limits on lines had been cut due to the heavy rain.
It comes as continuing problems with the landslip-plagued A83 at the Rest and be Thankful means it remains closed, while the single-track alternative, the Old Military Road (OMR) remaining closed throughout Tuesday as a safety precaution due to heavy rain moving in. This leaves motorists with a 60-mile long diversion.
The warnings come as a yellow weather warning remained in force in parts of the Highlands.
The Met Office has warned of possible looding is possible in places along with disruption to travel.
It said that bust and train services would be affected with journey times taking longer The forecaster said there was a small chance that some communities become cut off by flooded roads.
And it warned of a small that homes and businesses could be flooded, causing damage to some buildings The Met Office warning, which remains in force until 3pm on Wednesday, has been extended to cover most of Ross-shire, the Black Isle, southern Sutherland, Inverness-shire west of the Great Glen, and most of Lochaber. It extends as far south as Argyll & Bute and Loch Lomond.
There are currently Scottish Environment Protection Agency eleven flood alerts and five flood warnings covering parts of Caithness and Sutherland; Central Scotland, Tayside, Abereenshire and Aberdeen City, Argyll and Bute, Dumfries and Galloway, Easter Ross and the Great Glen; Findhorn, Nairn, Moray and Speyside; Skye and Lochaber; Wester Ross and Western Isles.
ScotRail said that northbound services from Inverness to Wick will not call at Thurso.
⚠️YELLOW @metoffice warning for heavy rain currently in force until 3pm tomorrow. Teams are on high alert to respond to any issues across the network - please drive to conditions if out. More info here: https://t.co/fwrihDIb19 ⚠️ pic.twitter.com/ZCANQQffPR
— BEAR NW Trunk Roads (@NWTrunkRoads) November 17, 2020
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 here