Tidal surge hits east UK coastal towns after storm

Thousands of people have been evacuated from their homes

A tidal surge has hit coastal towns on the east of Britain after thousands of people were evacuated from their homes.

The North Sea surge, predicted to be the worst for 60 years, reached north Norfolk in the evening and made its way south through the night.
Flood waters have receding in many areas but there will be further high tides later on Friday.
Scotland is facing snow alerts after a fierce storm earlier battered the UK, claiming two lives.

A wooden building which has slipped down a sand bank onto a beach

Five beach chalets collapsed in Hemsby, Norfolk, due to the tidal surge

The sea seen through the front windows of a beach chalet - the rest of which has collapsed

Parts of the collapsed chalets remained as sections fell onto the beach

Environment Secretary Owen Paterson chaired a meeting of the government's Cobra committee to discuss the floods.

Weather information

From the BBC:

Elsewhere:

"There will still be exceptionally high tides today and tomorrow and I would ask everybody to pay very close attention to advice from the Environment Agency and also to follow instructions from the police, local government and the emergency services," he said afterwards.

The Environment Agency, which covers England and Wales, has dozens of severe flood warnings in place.
Many of the severe warnings - which mean "danger to life" - relate to areas in the east of England, where there are also about 200 lower-level warnings and alerts.
The agency said some flood defences had been breached but repairs were under way.
A second tidal surge, which the agency said should be 1m (3ft) lower, has already passed Scotland and the far north of England and should reach Great Yarmouth at about 11:00 GMT and London at 15:00.
Collapsed properties Rescue teams have been working through the night in many areas.

Firefighters doing house to house checks in Blakeney, Norfolk, after a tidal surge hit

Firefighters carried out house-to-house checks in Blakeney, Norfolk, overnight

A man pushes a bike through knee-deep water

Many residents have been evacuated in Great Yarmouth, Norfolk

In other developments:

9,000 people have evacuated their homes in Norfolk, mainly in the Great Yarmouth area, where at least 26 properties have been flooded and a lifeboat station has been washed into the sea
Five beach chalets collapsed in Hemsby, Norfolk, due to the tidal surge
Soldiers have helped the flood prevention effort in Norfolk and Essex
The Environment Agency said 400 homes in the Humber region were affected by flood water on Thursday night
In Kent, more than 500 properties were evacuated in areas including Sandwich, Seasalter, Faversham and the Medway towns
Homes were flooded in Boston, Lincolnshire, and 223 in the county spent Thursday night in rest centres

Transport connections are expected to return to normal in much of Scotland in the wake of the storm.

Fleeing the floods

Nick Beake BBC News

For Essex pensioners Joan and Reenie, the staffroom of a local secondary school became home for the night.
In all, more than 400 people who had been evacuated from the coastal resort of Jaywick tried to get some sleep among the wall displays and whiteboards.
A few miles away the waves had pummelled against the sea defences just metres from their homes. They told us they had never seen the water that high.
Around 2am, high tide came. We witnessed the nervousness as the waves began splashing over the sea wall.
The emergency services had advised residents in 2,500 homes here to leave. While many did just that - others like Jane Nash didn't move an inch.
In the end, their worst fears were not realised and Jaywick fared much better than others spots along the east coast.
They'll be hoping that luck continues when the next two high tides arrive in the coming 24 hours.

Trains across Scotland were stopped on Thursday, but ScotRail said it expected to run services as scheduled from the start of Friday.

The Scottish Environment Protection Agency has now lifted its flood warnings but the Met Office has yellow weather warnings in place for snow in northern Scotland until 12:00 GMT.
There are also yellow warnings for ice in parts of Northern Ireland and north-west England, and wind on England's east coast. Yellow warnings mean "be aware".
High tides in parts of north Wales battered by storms hours earlier passed without further major flooding.
Lifeboat crews from south Wales were drafted in to help colleagues in the north amid fears coastal areas could be hit for a second time in 24 hours.
But emergency services have reported a mostly quiet Friday morning so far.
Northern Ireland Electricity (NIE) said it had restored power to most customers after strong winds caused disruption to supplies.

A map of flood warnings in England and Wales

Three rescue workers walk down a flooded street at night

Homes have been flooded in Boston, Lincolnshire

An emergency rescue service worker peers through the window of a bungalow as he wades in flood water in a residential street in Rhyl, north Wales

Parts of North Wales, including Rhyl, flooded on Thursday

BBC weather presenter Matt Taylor explained that "storm surges" begin when a rising area of low pressure takes pressure off the surface of the sea, allowing it to "bulge" upwards.

The BBC's Nick Beake spoke to people in Clacton-on-Sea in Essex, who evacuated their homes overnight

"Then, as that pulls away, you get the very strong winds on the back edge of the low pressure and then that shoves that bulge of high sea levels down through the North Sea," he said.
Conditions across the UK are expected to have improved by the weekend.