Melting snow and heavy rainfall could cause dangerous flooding across large parts of England and Wales this week.
The Met Office has issued an amber warning for rain as two months’ worth of rain is set to fall in a day on already-saturated ground from melting snow.
The severe weather warning includes Leeds, Manchester, Sheffield and Wakefield and is valid from 6am tomorrow until midnight on Wednesday.
A further yellow warning is issued across the rest of England and Wales on Wednesday and Thursday.
Chief meteorologist from the Met Office, Neil Armstrong, said: ‘A wide area of rainfall will move across central parts of the UK on Monday evening and bring heavy rain for the following 36 to 48 hours.
‘The rain will be heaviest across western facing hills, in particular parts of the southern Pennines and northern Peak District where we could see up to 120mm over the course of the warning period with 40 to 70mm of rain widely across the whole amber area.
‘Heavy rain will impact the whole of England and Wales by Wednesday with yellow warnings for rain in force.
‘By Thursday 100 to 150mm of rain could fall over high ground in Wales and Northern England.
‘As well as rainfall, rapid snow melt will add to these accumulations, adding 5 to 10mm in the worst affected areas.
‘These amounts of rainfall along with snow melt present a real threat of flooding, keep up to date with the latest Met Office forecast as well as flood warnings from the Environment Agency and Natural Resources Wales.’
There are fears whole communities could be cut off and infrastructure disrupted as a result of fast-flowing floodwater.
People in the affected areas have been warned to take ‘immediate action’ to protect themselves from flooding, such as packing a bag and moving valuable possessions.
It comes as the emergency services are already under extreme pressure due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Although most of the snow from last week has now melted, further snow is predicted after the rainfall.
The Met Office says due to milder temperatures the chance of snow is reduced at the beginning of the week, but colder air is returning to the UK at the end of the week.
From Thursday there is a chance of further snowfall in the North.
Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.
For more stories like this, check our news page.