Severe weather

Powerful winds have swept across northern Slovenia, damaging buildings, toppling trees, causing disruption to air and road traffic and cutting power to thousands of households. Schools have been closed and residents warned to remain indoors as emergency crews rushed to clear debris.No major injuries have been reported as authorities issued emergency alerts to mobile phones of residents in 43 municipalities that are home to roughly one quarter of Slovenia's population warning them to stay indoors, not to try to save property, and to avoid power lines.The strong winds started in the Primorska region in the west on 26 March before moving to the Gorenjska region in the north and then also hitting the Štajerska region with Slovenia's second largest city. They are expected to persist through the evening on 27 March before abating during the night.Over the past 24 hours the Environment Agency recorded gusts reaching speeds of 100-150 km/h in the mountains, and between 80 km/h and over 100 km/h on low ground. Although winds will persist meterologist Brane Gregorčič said they reduced red alert to amber for Friday night and to yellow on Saturday.Leon Behin, head of the Civil Protection and Disaster Relief Administration, said they had recorded over 800 incidents. "The number of calls to 112 emergency number topped 3,000, which is six to seven times the usual volume."About 270 units of firefighters, civil protection members and other rescue teams have responded to requests for assistance across several regions as strong northerly winds and localised snowfall created hazardous conditions.The southeast of the country has received snow, but snowfall should cease by the afternoon. The area of Gorjanci in the south now has over half a metre of snow.The strongest impacts were reported in the regions of Gorenjska, Primorska and Štajerska, where emergency services responded to numerous incidents involving fallen trees and damaged roofs.In the Gorenjska region alone some 650 homes have been damaged and more than ten industrial and other buildings.Schools and kindergartens there as well as in the Upper Soča Valley are closed as is a primary school in Maribor where winds ripped off solar panels.The worst-hit municipalities included Radovljica, Žirovnica and Tržič, where the wind ripped roofing from buildings and uprooted trees that blocked roads and disrupted traffic.The roof of the birthplace of poet France Prešeren in Vrba, which has just been renovated, has been damaged as well as the roof of the primary school in Žirovnica in the same municipality. According to the Gorenjska civil service commander Klemen Šmid, over 60% of the roofs in the community have been damaged.In Primorska, Cerkno and Kobarid reported severe wind damage to buildings, and wind badly damaged a new TKK Srpenica industrial building in Bovec.Damage to the electricity distribution network left tens of thousands of households without power across several regions.More than 21,500 customers in the area covered by Elektro Maribor in the east were without electricity on the morning of 27 March,with additional outages reported in areas served by Elektro Celje and Elektro Ljubljana. In Gorenjska alone, around 500 households temporarily lost power, mainly near Tržič and Radovljica.In the Maribor area, which faced massive outages in a snowstorm just over a month ago, power outages have also led to disruption in potable water supply. Utility crews have already been able to restore supply to half of the affected residents, Boštjan Barl, an official from grid operator ELES, said, adding that they would supply generators to restore water supply as soon as possible.Firefighters and road maintenance teams have been clearing windthrow and authorities warned that unstable trees and strong gusts could still pose a danger.Strong winds have also been obstructing air traffic at Ljubljana Airport. Several flights had to be diverted to nearby airports or cancelled. Winds gusted at speeds of up to 90 km/h there.A Wizz Air flight from Skopje and a Lufthansa flight from Frankfurt and a Swiss flight from Zurich on 26 March were all rerouted to Italy and the next morning flight to Franfurt was cancelled. Air Serbia flights to and from Belgrade have been delayed.Fierce winds have also affected the Ski Jumping World Cup final in Planica in the northwest of the country. The morning training session for women, who will compete on the giant hill for the first time in history on Saturday, has been delayed until the afternoon.

On Thursday only one training session for men went through and the qualifying round for today's competition was interrupted to wait for the winds to abate a little.

The Environment Agency brought a new instrument to the outrun of the giant hill this year to measure wind movements at heights up to 200 metres. The wind lidar can calculate wind speed and direction using reflections of light from particles carried by the wind.