Updated at 1355 EAT ON February 2022.

HICGI News Agency: Dozens of people living next to Britain’s longest river in Shropshire and Worcestershire were told to get out on Monday amid ‘danger to life’ warnings and fears that flood defences could fail after three storms in five days.

Britons refusing to leave their homes along the flooded River Severn despite an evacuation order have been warned they are risking their lives as the water threatened to reach its highest ever level following Storm Franklin.

Shocking photographs show buildings left submerged in flood waters after three storms Dudley, Eunice and Franklin –struck in the past week, leaving 1.5million households without electricity at times. The Energy Networks Association’s latest update at 4pm yesterday revealed around 7,600 properties were still without power. 

Throughout today, northern parts of Britain face 70mph winds and up to 1ft (30cm) of snow – but this incoming storm from the Atlantic has not yet been named by the Met Office. The next named storm will be called Gladys.

Flooding continued to affect trains between England and Wales this morning – with no service between Swansea and Shrewsbury via Llandrindod, or Shrewsbury to Newtown. Elsewhere, a landslip caused disruption between ​​​​​​​Shrewsbury and Hereford – while, in South Yorkshire, Rotherham Central station remained closed due to flooding.

In Scotland, speed restrictions due to the weather delayed trains, while services were not stopping at Thurso – Britain’s most northerly station – with passengers instead taking a 16-seat minibus from Georgemas Junction.

Today, strong winds and heavy snow are again expected to hit the UK – and the Met Office has issued a yellow warning for wind across North East England, Cumbria, North Yorkshire and parts of Scotland from 6am to 3p.

A second yellow warning for wind and snow covers much of Scotland and Northern Ireland from 1pm today until 3pm tomorrow – with up to 1ft (30cm) of snow likely and the possibility of 70mph gusts around coasts. Forecasters said frequent heavy snow showers are expected, along with a chance of lightning affecting some places.

Travel is expected to be hard hit again, with motorists warned they may ‘become stranded’, while rail, air and ferry services risk cancellations and delays. And tens of thousands of homes just recently reconnected to power supplies face the prospect of further outages as overnight temperatures plunge to -6C (21F) tomorrow.

The Environment Agency issued two severe flood warnings for Ironbridge in Shropshire and Bewdley in Worcestershire which remained in place this morning, along with a further 64 normal flood warnings and 66 flood alerts across England. Wales has one warning and six alerts in place, while Scotland has five warnings.

The River Severn near Ironbridge reached 6.58m (21.5ft) yesterday afternoon. But officials warned residents that the level could reach 7.2m (23.6ft), passing the record from November 2000 of 7.04m (23.09ft), which could unleash the worst floods in the history of the town which is a popular tourist spot and a World Heritage Site.