Snow and wind caused travel disruption across parts of the Highlands yesterday – just days before the start of May.
An early morning crash involving a lorry on the A9 Inverness-Perth road at Slochd Summit resulted in the road being closed for about an hour in both directions.
Police attended the crash which happened just before 6am, and issued a warning to drivers of poor road conditions in the area.
A Met Office meteorologist said yesterday that snow has affected the region in late April for the past two years – but that the last time prior to this was 2001.
Cold temperatures were compounded by icy winds across the region, with gusts reaching 45mph in parts of the west Highlands making for difficult tidal conditions and disruption to several of CalMac’s ferry crossings.
Today’s 6.15pm and 6.45pm sailings between Portavadie and Tarbert have been cancelled, as have afternoon sailings between Tobermory and Kilchoan on Thursday, Friday and Saturday.
Motorists appeared to be unaffected by the weather yesterday.
However RSPB Loch Garten’s female osprey, EJ, has been having to conscientiously incubate her three eggs amid the persistent snow. Julie Quirie, retail manager at the centre’s shop, said she had worked there for 10 years and could not recall the snow being so bad at this time of year, which is the start of the osprey breeding season.
The cold snap will likely come to an end by the weekend and temperatures are expected to rise two degrees above the average seasonal maximum of 12C by the start of next week.
Meteorologist Alex Burkhill said that more than 3 ins of snow fell yesterday in the Aviemore area and that temperatures fell to below freezing early in the morning, rising to about 4C in the afternoon.
Early morning temperatures in the western isles stayed below 7C and gusts of up to 45mph could be felt in the likes of Stornoway and Skye.
Further north, temperatures dipped to -0.8C in Kinbrace and 0.4C in Wick, but rose to 6C and 6.7C respectively. Wind gusts of up to 40mph hit the region.
Mr Burkhill said that temperatures across the north will fluctuate between 5C and 8C today and then gradually rise in time for the weekend.
He added: “It’s not unheard of to see these cold temperatures as we had them this time last year, and the year before. But before that, you’d have to go back to 2001 for any major snow this late in April.”
Mr Burkhill added that the recent cold snap has been caused by a system of low pressure to the east and high pressure to the west which has created a northerly flow of Arctic air.
