Hundreds of schools will close and trains halted on Friday after the red warning for Storm Eunice.

A quick recap of the main issues after Storm Dudley swept across the UK.

• Network Rail says it was hit "really hard" by the storm but services were almost completely restored by mid-morning after major overnight effort
• Further weather warnings related to Storm Eunice remain in place for Friday with parts of England and Wales upgraded to red
• Thousands of people were left without power in northern England and small pockets tackled in the south of Scotland too

Image source, carntsleep/BBC Weather Watchers.

Mammatus clouds formed over parts of Scotland during Wednesday's Storm Dudley.

According to the Met Office, the unusual clouds with their pouches and bulges form in association with huge and unstable cumulonimbus clouds, which often bring heavy rain.

Mammatus comes from the Latin mamma which translates to "udder" or "breast".

In Croxhoe, a village near Durham, Ronnie Neirn spent several hours in his car trying to keep warm because he had no heating due to power outages.

John Willis, who lives in the same village, was also hit by a power cut on Wednesday.

"It's not the first time. [It happened] last year and the year before, we always have trouble," he told the BBC.

His grandson, who was at the house to drop round battery-powered lights, said: "My granddad's partially sighted as well so it's a bit dangerous."

Image source, Getty Images

A flood warning put in place by the Scottish Environment Protection Agency in Ayrshire during Storm Dudley has been lifted.

However, alerts for the area and four other parts of the country remain in place.

Argyll and Bute, Dumfries and Galloway, Skye and Lochaber and West Central Scotland are still on alert for coastal flooding., external

Northern Powergrid says it is working to reconnect about 280 homes in the Coxhoe area of County Durham still affected from power losses caused by Storm Dudley.

The company restored power to about 19,000 properties in the North East after high winds hit the region on Wednesday.

Chris Wilson, from Coxhoe, told BBC Radio Newcastle it had been a long night with no electricity.

"It's been very cold with the power going on and off between 18:00 and 20:00 but by 20:30 it was all off and is still off," Mr Wilson said.

"I just had to go to bed and I'm worried all the food in the freezer is getting wasted because we don't know how long it's going to go on for."

Image source, Google

Scotland's railway routes are 'open for business' again, Network Rail has said.

Engineers carried out safety checks on 1500 miles of track overnight after Storm Dudley.

A handful of signalling issues remain affecting lines at Lanark, Largs and Girvan. Otherwise, the network is back to normal operation.

The Met Office is warning of significant disruption and danger to life from Storm Eunice on Friday, with gusts of up to 80mph.

Around the coasts of west Wales and south-west England, gusts of up to 100mph are possible, the Met Office said. Such strong winds are very unusual for these parts of the UK.

With the possibility of such high wind speeds, BBC Weather presenter Simon King said the warning could be upgraded to red - the highest level - if the Met Office's confidence that these speeds will be reached increases.

He said the wind strengths forecast for southern parts of the UK were comparable to the Burns' Day Storm of January 1990, which caused widespread damage, and the storms which hit the UK during the winter of 2013-2014.

Storm Dudley swept across the north of England and Scotland on Wednesday night, causing travel disruption into the morning. A recap of the main issues.

• Network Rail says it was hit "really hard" by the storm and work is ongoing to restore services
• Although some weather warnings have been lifted more are in place for Friday for high winds and snow
• Thousands of people were left without power in northern England with some small pockets still being tackled in southern Scotland
• Calmac's managing director says there is an "improving picture" on its ferry services
• It is hoped that by later today most rail services could be running but they are liable to further cancellation and disruption

Image source, Getty Images

Naming storms in the UK is still quite a new system. The Met Office started doing it in 2015 along with forecasters in Ireland. Later the Netherlands joined in.

A name is given when a storm is expected to cause medium or high impacts - when it has the potential to cause an amber or red warning.

It's to make the public more aware when severe weather is on the way, with the idea that you'll hear the name and know serious wind, rain or snow is coming.

BBC Newsbeat explains how the system works

Image source, Met Office

A Met Office warning for ice is about to be lifted for northern Scotland but more are in store for Friday.

An amber warning for high winds during Storm Eunice covers much of England and Wales from 03:00 to 21:00.

A yellow warning for wind and snow further north is in place from 03:00 to 18:00.

Ross Easton, from the Energy Networks Association, told BBC Breakfast that preparations were underway for more power disruption from Storm Eunice.

On Wednesday evening, Electricity North West said it had restored power to 630 properties but 1,577 were still without power.

At one point nearly 1,700 homes in Wigan and about 1,000 homes in Durham were also without electricity.

In the wake of Storm Dudley, weather forecasters are warning of more problems on the horizon.

A second storm - Storm Eunice - is expected to affect parts of Scotland, England, Northern Ireland and Wales on Friday.

The Met Office said conditions could be even more damaging than Storm Dudley, with stronger winds, heavy snow and possible blizzards in Scotland.

Jamie McIvor
BBC Scotland News Correspondent

Image source, Network Rail

Despite continued disruption this morning here at Glasgow's Central Station there are sign that the rail network is starting to come back to life.

As things stand at the moment the vast majority of services have been cancelled with ScotRail expecting major disruption across the network to continue until 10am.

The advice is to check your journey before you leave home. Virtually all trains in Scotland stopped at 4pm yesterday as a precaution against Storm Dudley.

In terms of the rail infrastructure, we know that there was damage to a gantry which supports power cables on the line near Kilwinning in Ayrshire, but it is understood that that problem has now been repaired.

So the hope is that by later on today most services will be running across Scotland - but they will be liable to cancellation and disruption.

• Report from Glasgow's Central Station

Image source, PA Media

Image source, Getty Images

Brief power cuts throughout Dumfries and Galloway overnight have mostly been tackled following issues during Storm Dudley.

SP Energy Networks said there was one ongoing in Beattock but it should have been addressed by 11:00.

Image source, PA Media

Some services are returning across Scotland after being suspended due to Storm Dudley but most are still on hold until later this morning.

ScotRail said on Twitter, external that it expected things to improve from about 10:00 onwards.

It posted a full list of services which were back up and running.

Image source, Traffic Scotland

Although the warning for high winds has lifted, a Met Office alert for ice in the north of Scotland remains in force until 10:00.

Traffic Scotland said there were "difficult driving conditions" as it posted some images of the road network , externalon Twitter

Good Morning Scotland
BBC Radio Scotland

The managing director of CalMac ferries, Robbie Drummond, has told BBC Radio Scotland's Good Morning Scotland programme that the operator was seeing an improving picture today.

Despite the winds from Strom Dudley, which resulted in waves as high as an eight-storey building, Calmac ran 214 sailings - more than 54% of the timetable - yesterday.

Mr Drummond said CalMac was looking to run more services today, but he admitted that the majority of routes would still be subject to disruption.

The sailings worst affected include Coll and Tiree and Harris and Lewis.

Mr Drummond added that the services were on a mix of red, amber and green alert and he urged passengers to check before travelling.

Power has now been restored to about 19,000 homes and businesses across the north of England who were affected by Storm Dudley.

Northern Powergrid said it was still working to restore supplies for about 1,000 properties which were still affected.

It manages the electricity network across the north-east of England, Yorkshire and northern Lincolnshire.

Thousands of people were left without power after Storm Dudley hit parts of the North East, Cumbria, North Yorkshire and Lancashire.

At one point nearly 1,700 homes in Wigan were without power. Electricity North West sent engineers to deal with the problem, which was caused by strong winds.

BBC Breakfast was at the scene this morning.