National Grid working to restore power to homes

National Grid said fallen trees due to the storm's strong winds were the main cause of ongoing supply issues

More than 3,000 properties remain without power in the aftermath of Storm Darragh over the weekend.

In its latest update on Tuesday afternoon, National Grid said 3,886 properties in Devon and 409 in Cornwall were still cut off.

Darragh was the fourth named storm of the season, following Storm Ashley, Storm Bert and Storm Conall, with winds gusting to up to 96mph (155km/h).

National Grid said fallen trees due to the storm's strong winds were the main cause of ongoing supply issues.

'Biggest storm'

It added the trees were "causing difficulties accessing sites as well as damage to the network."

Field operations director Roisin Quinn said: "Storm Darragh is the biggest storm our region has faced in decades.

"Our engineers, control rooms, contact centre and support teams have been working around the clock to maintain power across the network.

"We continue to see extremely high volumes of calls to our contact centre and I'm afraid it is taking a little longer for customers to get through.

"I want to thank customers for their patience and understanding and assure you all that we are doing everything we can to get power restored across the region as soon as possible."

Winds were reported as gusting quite widely over 70mph (112km/h), even inland.

The record for the South West is still 118mph (189km/h) at Gwennap Head in Cornwall on 15 December 1979.

The beech, thought to be more than 200 years old, was damaged by extreme gales during Storm Darragh

At Paignton Zoo in Devon, Storm Darragh ripped apart a beech tree which was thought to be more than 200 years old.

The tree was damaged by the extreme gales, crushing a wooden hut in its wake.

Paignton Zoo was closed on Saturday due to the weather conditions - a decision which bosses said was partly due to the risk posed by branches being blown off trees.

Catherine Mortimer, curator of gardens for Wild Planet Trust, which operates Paignton Zoo, said: "Sadly, with these extreme weather events becoming more common, we expect that we will continue to lose more of these very old trees."