A number of visitors who travelled to Shetland to enjoy Up Helly Aa have been stranded on the island due to severe weather.
The island’s biggest fire festival took place in Lerwick on Tuesday evening with people travelling from across the world to witness the spectacle in person.
Although the strong winds stayed away during the main event, they are now causing significant disruption for those trying to travel home.
The Met Office issued a yellow weather warning for wind across the country throughout Wednesday, and warned of widespread gales.
The north of Scotland was forecast to be the “stormiest” with winds reaching more than 80mph in Shetland.
Travel disruption for Up Helly Aa visitors
The strong winds have caused significant travel disruption across the island forcing many Up Helly Aa visitors to extend their stays.
Northlink Ferries cancelled their sailings via Lerwick due to the “adverse weather forecast”.
Meanwhile, dozens of passengers spent hours at Sumburgh Airport waiting to hear if their flights would be able to go ahead.
The journeys scheduled to depart and arrive at the airport today, to and from Aberdeen, Inverness, Glasgow and Edinburgh, were all cancelled.
Aberdeen passengers were originally told their 4.05pm flight would be able to travel at 7.45pm, before it was officially cancelled at 4.30pm leaving passengers and airline staff “scrambling” to organise accommodation.
As many rooms filled up following the earlier flight and ferry cancellations, some visitors have had to be transported by bus to hotels as far as Brae.
One passenger, who was scheduled to fly to Aberdeen, said: “Up Helly Aa was amazing but it has been overshadowed by this last part of the trip.
“It’s been incredibly frustrating but the airport staff were great at providing accommodation to everyone who had been stranded.”
Weather warnings in place
Travel plans for others have had to be pushed back to Sunday, four days later than planned.
A Loganair spokesman said: “The Met Office had issued yellow weather warnings for Wednesday January 31across Scotland.
With the potential for travel disruption, Loganair offered all customers the opportunity to adjust travel plans in advance without charge.
For those caught up in the weather disruption on the day, we did our best to ensure customers were looked after and we’d like to thank them for their patience and understanding.”
Up Helly Aa: I travelled 10,000 miles from Australia to come to Shetland’s famous fire festival
