Alert – Weird moment Storm Babet lifts up entire forest floor – complete with a baffled dog on top

This is the bizarre moment Storm Babet appeared to lift the forest floor – with a baffled dog stuck on top of the undulating ground. 

The footage was captured by a dog walker in Scotland as the deadly storm continues to batter Britain on Saturday. 

Lashing winds from the storm – which has caused widespread mayhem and destruction – seemingly ripped up a patch of woodland in Stirlingshire.

David Nugent-Malone was walking his dog Jake in Mugdock on a path. ‘We’ve walked through that particular section literally hundreds of times before and have never seen anything like that’, Mr Nugent-Malone told the BBC.

Mr Nugent-Malone claimed the woodland around them was relatively calm after the strongest winds blasted it the night before. 

However, that particular patch of pocket of the forest seemed to  ‘focus the wind to allow it to lift up the woodland floor,’ he added.

He posted the clip on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, with the caption: ‘The earth was breathing deeply this morning.’ 

The footage came as Storm Babet shows no signs of abating as downpours continue to batter much of the UK on Saturday following three deaths in ‘biblical’ conditions that have seen up to two months of rain hit parts of the UK in the space of three days.

Homes in Brechin, Angus, have been evacuated as the banks of the River South Esk burst after surging 5m higher than normal; in nearby Fowlis, outside Dundee, the coastguard were called to help after a bridge collapsed, taking a car with it. 

The storm has claimed the lives of six people since Thursday including two in Angus, Scotland: a 57-year-old woman who died after being swept into a river and a 56-year-old man in the region who was killed by a falling tree that struck his van.

A man in his 60s died after getting caught in fast-flowing flood water in Cleobury Mortimer, Shropshire on Friday; police found his body two hours after he disappeared under the water.

Elsewhere, a crash in Calderdale near Halifax, West Yorkshire on Friday night left the 19-year-old driver of a white Seat Ibiza dead and their 18-year-old passenger fighting for their life. The weather conditions were ‘a factor’ in the crash, reports The Sun.

Dramatic images shared on social media showed the vehicle submerged in the road up to its front doors; locals said the occupant was rescued by a local farmer.

The end of Scotland’s red alert has been brought forward six hours to 6pm, from midnight – but the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency (SEPA) has warned of a ‘difficult day ahead’ amid fears rivers could burst their banks again.

Police Scotland has advised against all but essential travel, as searches continue for a man missing in Aberdeenshire said to have been trapped in a vehicle in floodwater early on Friday.

Yellow and amber warnings in place across large swathes of England have been lifted save for a yellow ‘be aware’ alert for wind that stretches from Whitby in Yorkshire all the way up to Aberdeen.

But flood warnings remain active as of Saturday: across England, there were 353 warnings and 248 alerts; Scotland has five severe flood warnings, 17 flood warnings and 10 flood alerts in place; 14 flood alerts, one severe warning and eight other warnings are in effect in Wales.

In England, 55,000 people were left without power on Friday; 45,000 of those were reconnected last night, the Energy Networks Association said. Around 33,000 Scots lost power as a result of the weather, with the majority now reconnected.

A yellow Met Office alert for rain remains in place for most of central and north-eastern Scotland, with amber rain warnings across Highland Perthshire and the eastern Highlands north of Inverness. 

Met forecaster Jonathan Vautrey told the PA news agency: ‘The focus of the rainfall from Saturday shifts back northwards over towards eastern and northern Scotland.

‘Some parts of those areas have seen about a month and a half’s worth of rain already, but there’s another band that’s forecast to track its way northwards over the course of the night and push its way towards relatively similar areas.

Mr Vautrey said the yellow wind warning across eastern Scotland and north-east England could bring ‘gales in excess of 60-70 miles per hour’, but added: ‘That is going to work its way off (the coast) throughout Saturday, so from a wind aspect there will be some improvement.’

More than 75 people were in rescue centres in Angus, east Scotland, while Angus Council said people in more than 60 homes in Brechin, who refused previous evacuation attempts, required rescue.