I saw overturned lorries ‘scattered like ninepins’ during Storm Bram

A football fan stuck in hours of tailbacks during Storm Bram has described seeing at least 10 overturned lorries “scattered like ninepins” on the M74.

Andy Paterson was making the journey from his home in Houston, Renfrewshire, to watch his hometown club Queen of the South play Dunfermline.

He compared the scene on the motorway near Abington, which was closed to traffic for most of the night, as “almost like a zombie movie”.

Mr Paterson eventually made his way home on back roads after learning that the cup tie had been postponed 10 minutes after kick off.

Police Scotland said the M74 reopened on Wednesday morning following a vehicle recovery operation. No-one was injured.

At the height of the storm, gusts of 76mph were recorded in South Uist, with similar speeds felt in Lanarkshire and Dumfries and Galloway.

An amber weather warning was in place in the Western Isles while the south of Scotland was covered by a yellow alert.

The semi-retired occupational health nurse finished his shift at Marks and Spencer in Paisley at about 14:00 and went for his flu jab before setting off in conditions he called “a wee bit windy”.

As well as going to the Queen of the South game in Dumfries, he also hoped to take Christmas presents to his sister.

However, after a stop at Cairn Lodge services for a sausage roll and a coffee and to use the toilets, he encountered problems.

“I only got about two miles, and then all of a sudden everything just ground to a complete halt really, really quickly, with no warning,” he said.

“What had happened was there must have been a huge blast of wind and what I saw later on was all these lorries had overturned.

“But at the time, I was just stuck in the traffic, not moving.”

He said three or four fire engines and a couple of ambulances appeared.

“It got quite dark and everybody’s turned off their engines because they were sitting there for two hours or so as it turned out, and it was just really, really windy,” he said.

“You could see there was a Tesco lorry in front of me.

“It was moving a foot or two either side with the winds – really properly shaking – I was quite glad I wasn’t the car on the inside of that.”

Once he was allowed past, he was greeted by dramatic scenes.

“It was like something out of almost a zombie movie or something,” he said.

“It was just lorries scattered all over the place.

“I think I counted about 10 on the southbound that were overturned and there was one definitely off the road and overturned down an embankment on the northbound.”

He said he felt fortunate to have taken his break at the time he did.

“It was quite scary,” he said.

“I mean, if I hadn’t stopped to go to the services before, I might be right in the middle of that.

“I kind of feel a wee bit lucky from that point of view, because I think it must have happened all quite quickly.”

Having heard reports of trees down and with the match now looking unlikely to take place he decided to turn around and head back home after a stop at Abington services.

“I used my sat nav and managed to find a way up on a sort of minor road towards Lanark and back on to the M74 just above where it had all been closed,” he said.

“So I got home at 21:00, which was actually earlier than I would have been had I got to the game, but it felt like quite a long day.

“Somebody’s underestimated the weather because the amount of damage in terms of what’s happened with all these trucks, it feels like that was a bit worse than just a yellow warning.

“I wouldn’t have travelled if it was an amber warning, and it feels like it maybe ought to have been.”

He will have to make the trip down to Dumfries to deliver Christmas presents at a later date and is hoping the cup tie will be rescheduled for midweek when he fully intends to travel again.