Music lovers courageous the downpours a Reading competition

Revellers are Reading Festival have not been deterred by the downpours in Berkshire today, standing in their poncho-clad outfits ready to rave to their favourite artists. 

Storm Lilian is set to batter parts of Britain today as motorists prepare to brave roads during the busiest August bank holiday on record. 

The Met Office has issued a weather warning for south east of England, as parts of the country prepare for between 50mm and 70mm. 

The warning, which came into force at 6am and lasts until 1pm, stretches from Portsmouth, Hampshire, up to Ipswich in Suffolk.

Although the heavy rainfall has left festivalgoers drenched, they are still all smiles as they watch the likes of The Last Dinner Party take to the stage. 

Elsewhere in Leeds, the weather has brightened up after winds battered the site on Thursday night as organisers urged campers to stay in their cars for ‘safety’.

The northern music event made the decision yesterday to close three of its stages -The BBC Radio 1 stage, the Aux stage and Chevron – due to the extreme weather conditions.

And despite the promising sunshine today, organisers decided to permanently shut the Aux and BBC One stage for the remainder of the festival. 

Disappointed fans mourned a long list of big names who were due to perform on the three stages today, including Skrillex, Beabadoobee and singer-songwriter Alfie Templeman. 

Revellers at the Leeds Festival demanded refunds as Storm Lilian shut down three stages and wild winds sent tents flying. 

Snapped poles and bits of torn fabric were strewn all over the campsite this morning after festivalgoers spent the night huddled together to try to stay warm in their battered tents. Shocking footage showed tents flattened entirely or even taking flight

One furious X user wrote: ‘This is poor. Friday ticket holders deserve a refund. I won’t be returning if we don’t get compensated for this.’

Festival buses taking revellers from the city centre to the site were cancelled all morning as a result of the poor weather. Organisers recommended music fans to ‘enjoy Leeds City Centre’ before making their way to the festival.

A let-down music fan asked organisers: ‘Will there be any form of refunds for the massively disrupted travel and half the acts being cancelled?

‘Especially for those who bought single day tickets who can’t actually get into the festival before about 2pm or later now.’

Another frustrated festival-goer posted: ‘We need refunds really. Half a day and half the stages. Not cool and not safe.’

One music fan, Ellie, posted a video online showing her tent getting ripped apart by the high winds. She wrote: ‘Go to Leeds fest, it’ll be fun, they said…’

The footage shows the green tent flapping wildly while a man struggles to keep it on the ground.

Former Oasis star Liam Gallagher, who is due to headline the music festival on Friday evening asked the youngster if he would retweet her video.

Others suggested Mary Poppins should be invited to headline the event given her skill with an umbrella while facing rambunctious meteorological conditions.

One group of friends made a pragmatic decision in removing all of the tent poles and lying on top of their temporary shelter to prevent it jetting off into the heavens. 

Earlier on Friday morning, Reading and Leeds Festival urged attendees to stay in tents if they are on site and feel safe to do so.

They added: ‘If you are in your car, please remain there. If you are not yet at the festival site, please delay your arrival.

‘We’re expecting it to ease up at 10am and we will update you in 30 minutes. Your safety is our number one priority. Remember to look out for each other.

A Leeds attendee said she was experiencing the ‘worst day ever’ as her tent had been destroyed and her group had been asked to leave their area because of the windy conditions.

Carrie Gill, 19, said she was waiting in a McDonald’s and will likely be waiting there ‘for a while’.

She said: ‘All the rain came in [to the tent] because the poles pulled so hard from the wind the fabric ripped open and leaked the whole tent with the rain. We even put those rock plastic pegs in the bottom and they have snapped.

‘We aren’t allowed back into the area for hours, all our stuff is in our mates’ tent, phone’s on 30 per cent.

‘All the stores have blown over, the urinal walls are gone and lads are just p****** against fences, people’s tents are in the sky, the store shops are all over the floor and shirts and things from stores are gone. It’s honestly really bad here.’

She also revealed that if her new tipi ‘doesn’t last’, she will be forced to return home.

‘As you can imagine being a student, it’s quite an expensive festival to be going to and to be let down like this,’ she added.

However other revellers haven’t let yesterday mornings bad weather get in the way of their Bank Holiday weekend as they braved the winds in their stylish outfits.

Leeds saw revellers descend on Bramham Park in their boho chic outfits despite the closure of the three stages.

Earlier, festival-goer, Dylan Maggs, 26, said he saw the perimeter wall fall on empty tents and smash a van window.

His group was ‘right next’ to the perimeter fence when it came down, saying: ‘It looks worse than it was for sure – no-one was inside of the tents when it came down. A fence also took out a van’s window.

‘We’re just laughing through it, not much else we can do really, it’s annoying but it is what it is. We’ve seen a lot of people ditch tents and leave.’

The 26-year-old added: ‘We’re currently sitting on our tents so they don’t fly away, Practically all of us are gripping onto our tents, and there’s six of us.’

Elsewhere Declan Donnelly, an an engineering production operator from Manchester, said his group ‘had to hold onto our tent for about one to two hours as well as double peg it as when the gusts hit it was nearly flying off’.

The 20-year-old added: ‘It seems to have calmed down now but there’s lots of tents ripped, collapsed and destroyed, with a fair few tents left by people who have chosen to go home.’

Similarly to the less than happy campers in Leeds, revellers at Creamfields in Cheshire suffered countryside hell yesterday.

A festivalgoers said it was ‘impossible’ to sleep because strong gusts shook his tent and others with ‘loads of people’ had been damaged.

Jason Kamara, 23, said: ‘We were told it’d be windy but we had no idea it would be that bad.

‘I think it felt worse from inside the tents but it was impossible to sleep because of the rattling sounds.

‘I got out of bed at 6am to have a look at the damage and found loads of people trying to fix their damaged tents and pegs that had come undone.

‘But to be honest it’s a distant memory now, the sun is out and everyone is in great spirits.

‘Everyone has embraced the British weather and made the most of a bad situation which is what makes Creamfields special.’

Videos captured at the wet and windy festival, showed glum festivalgoers wrestling with the wind to keep their belongings on the ground.

As wind and heavy downpour bashed against her tent, one Leeds reveller said: ‘This is the wind.

‘It’s not…it’s really not good. There’s water in our tent. Everyone’s screaming,’ she said as her tent began to cave in.

Even though the weather was looking slightly sunnier down south in Reading yesterday, one sleepy camper was caught up in Thursday night’s windy weather.

Appearing to have been blown away, the ruffled reveller was helped out of her blue tent by staff.

It comes as Storm Lilian caused travel chaos yesterday, with a number of train lines suspended due to toppled trees.  

Damage to overhead wires stopped all trains between Liverpool and Wigan North Western as Northern Rail gave passengers a ‘do not travel today’ warning as problems were so severe.

British Airways scrapped 16 flights from Heathrow Airport, frustrating Brits who had planned to jet abroad.

The latest weather alert comes ahead of what could be the busiest August bank holiday on the roads since records began.

The RAC estimates 19.2 million leisure trips by car will be made over the weekend, with 3.2 million yesterday alone.

This is the highest since the motoring services company began recording data for the summer bank holiday in 2015.

Liam Eslick, a meteorologist at the Met Office, said: ‘With that yellow warning, expect some small travel disruption.

‘I know it’s the start of the bank holiday so people may be out and about trying to get to their holiday destinations.

‘We do say take care when driving on roads, stick to the main roads where you can because more local tracks could see some surface water.

‘So do take care when travelling around through Saturday morning.’

The heaviest bout of the rain is expected to move away around mid-afternoon, but showers will linger around central and south east England, as well as western Scotland.

A wind warning was in place across northern England and North Wales until 11am on Friday, wreaking havoc throughout the country and causing major disruption to Leeds Festival.

‘Winds aren’t expected to be too much of an issue on Saturday though,’ said Mr Eslick. ‘It’s mainly going to be the rain.

‘Winds will be pretty light in the south of England, though you may get the odd gust around the very far South East through the English Channel.

‘But mainland is going to be pretty light.’

Moving into Sunday, conditions are expected to ease – though some showers are forecast in the east, Northern England and southern Scotland.

While it is predicted it will be a blistery day for parts of the country today, gales won’t be as strong as Friday morning, according to the Met Office.   

Looking ahead to the Bank Holiday Monday, Mr Eslick said: ‘Monday looks like the best of the days.

‘There will be more in the way of some sunshine and winds are expected to ease.

‘It will be a lot calmer coming into the Bank Holiday Monday and it will be nice to have that extra day this weekend to enjoy.’

Monday will bless Britons with ‘pleasant sunny spells’ but not for long as rain is expected, again largely in the north, on Tuesday.

This comes shortly after 18,000 houses in the north-west of England were left without power due to Storm Lilian yesterday.

Homes in Cheshire, Yorkshire and North Staffordshire were left without power this as Storm Lillian caused huge disruption in the regions. 

Three hundred houses in Durham as well as 80 houses in Yorkshire were also left without electricity overnight. 

Over 1,300 homes in North Staffordshire were hit with power cuts affecting Madeley, Keele, Bignall End and Halmerend and other nearby areas.

It was also a commuter’s nightmare in Wrexham, Chester, Carlisle, Chester, as well as in other northern cities as services were delayed or cancelled.

On the Humber Bridge in East Yorkshire a lorry almost toppled over as Storm Lilian’s 60mph winds dragged its wheels off the floor 

Daniel Garner and his colleagues were driving over the 100ft bridge around 7.30am this morning when they spotted the HGV.

The ‘worried’ tarmacer revealed he had never seen anything like the incident before. 

Shortly after, Humber Bridge’s official Twitter account announced they were closed to ‘high-sided and wind vulnerable vehicles’ at 7.34am and a speed limit of 20mph was imposed.

Daniel said: ‘I was worried it was going to go over the side.

‘We could tell as we were coming up the bridge how bad it was and we’d seen the wind was at 30mph but within a few minutes it was 60mph.

‘I saw the lorry tip a little bit so I got my phone out and then it nearly went over a couple of times.

‘If he’d have slowed down I would have got out and helped him but he carried on and got to the other side.

 

‘I posted the video to advise people not to go over because I’ve never seen anything like it. I couldn’t stop watching the video.’

The lorry came agonisingly close to tipping over as it travelled across the bridge over the River Humber on two occasions – with its left side appearing to lean precariously over the barriers. 

British Airways cancelled 14 flights scheduled to take off from Heathrow on Friday and delayed others, according to the airline’s website.

The cancellations include international flights to Italy, Switzerland and the US as well as domestic journeys to Scotland and Northern Ireland.