Europe’s autumn storm season has arrived with a vengeance. Storm Austen, the first named storm of the season for the UK, tore across southern England, Wales and the Channel Islands on Thursday and Friday, knocking out power, disrupting travel and toppling part of one of Britain’s best-known seaside ruins into the sea. Meanwhile, communities in eastern Spain are still cleaning up after Storm Adam unleashed extraordinary rainfall earlier in the week.

Here is a round-up of what we know, based on reporting from BBC News and The Guardian.

Power cuts and a pier lost to the waves

According to the BBC, more than 10,000 homes were still without power on Friday as Austen continued to batter southern England and Wales. The National Grid said its engineers had restored supplies to more than 60,000 properties since the storm began, a sign of how widespread the outages were at their peak.

The strongest gusts hit the Channel Islands. Jersey recorded gusts of up to 84mph (135km/h), while Guernsey saw gusts of up to 76mph, the equivalent of a severe gale. All schools on both islands were closed for the day, and some schools in Cornwall closed or opened late.

The most striking image of the storm came from Brighton. A section of the city’s West Pier, an abandoned structure that first opened in 1866 and closed to the public in 1975, collapsed into the sea as large waves pounded it. Onlookers filmed the moment. Although the pier has been a ruin for decades, its skeletal frame had become a familiar symbol of the Brighton seafront for many locals.

In Cornwall, families were evacuated from a holiday park in Perranporth ahead of the worst of the weather on Thursday afternoon.

Travel disruption on land, sea and air

Fallen trees blocked railway lines and roads across southern England, and National Rail warned that many routes were running at reduced speeds. Some ferry services between the UK and France were cancelled, and departure boards at Exeter airport showed multiple cancellations. Jersey Airport said flights would not run until at least 5 p.m. on Friday, and Cornwall Airport Newquay advised passengers to check with their airlines.

The ferry disruption has knock-on effects. The head of the Co-op in the Channel Islands told the BBC that fresh food shortages are expected in the coming days because supplies cannot get across.

Storm Boelo is next in line

There is little respite on the way. The Met Office has issued an amber warning for wind from 9 p.m. BST on Saturday to 9 p.m. BST on Sunday, covering much of Scotland, the far north of Northern Ireland and northern England, as Storm Boelo follows quickly behind Austen.

Gusts of 60 to 70mph are forecast in the amber area, with exposed coasts potentially seeing up to 80mph. Yellow warnings cover a wider area, and heavy, persistent rain on Saturday raises the risk of localized flooding on top of what Austen already dropped. The Met Office has urged people to drive cautiously and to secure loose outdoor items such as bins and trampolines.

The storm coincided with new UK government advice encouraging households to keep three days’ worth of bottled water and tinned food on hand for emergencies. Prime Minister Andy Burnham said the guidance was “not about panic buying” but about taking sensible steps to be prepared.

Spain’s deadly deluge

Further south, the Guardian reported that Storm Adam brought torrential rain to eastern Spain earlier in the week, with staggering totals. In Pego, in the province of Alicante, 632mm of rain fell in 36 hours, including 430mm in just six hours. Another town in the Valencia region recorded around 600mm in 24 hours.

The flooding led 145 municipalities across Valencia and Alicante to impose a temporary lockdown on roughly 850,000 people on Monday. At least five people have died, 500 have been rescued and 2,100 have been evacuated. The storm also hit the Balearic Islands, where more than 130 incidents were recorded in Ibiza and standing water at the airport caused some flights to be diverted or suspended.

Conditions in Valencia and Alicante are improving, but local disruption is expected to continue as clean-up gets under way.

What to watch

Forecasters say the coming days will stay unsettled across the UK and Ireland, with Storm Boelo bringing further damaging winds and rain to already saturated ground. Anyone in affected areas should keep an eye on official Met Office warnings, check travel plans before setting out and follow advice from local authorities.

For Spain, the focus now shifts to recovery, damage assessments and support for the families who lost loved ones or homes. After a week like this, both countries will be hoping the rest of the season is kinder.

Image: Waves crashing up through the boardwalk in Lysekil during Storm Ciara 1 by W.carter via Wikimedia Commons, CC0 1.0