BBC Scotland Correspondent Andrew Cassell reports

The warning came after a 74-year-old man was drowned when he was blown into a river as gales swept the UK on Monday.

The man, who has not been named, was blown into the River Almond, in Cramond, Edinburgh, as severe weather conditions continued to disrupt roads, railways and ferries.

Wind power: Part of the M73 was closed when this lorry toppled onto safety railings

Northern Ireland and Scotland were worst hit as wind speeds hit 80mph.

Homes in Dumfriesshire, Kintyre and Perthshire were blacked out when power lines were brought down, and a total of more than 13,000 Scottish homes were without electricity at the height of the disruption. Power cuts also hit 1,700 homes in Northern Ireland.

Largs was hit by the worst floods for nearly 30 years

Two overblown lorries blocked the M8 in Glasgow while the Forth Bridge in Edinburgh was closed to high-sided vehicles and caravans.

Caledonian-MacBrayne suspended or cancelled all early-morning ferry services on the west coast of Scotland.

The main east coast railway line is returning to normal after it was closed near Alnwick, Northumberland, when a train ran into fallen power cables.

Martin Collins talks to Sybil Ruscoe about the problems the floods are causing

Emergency services in Largs, Ayrshire, were called in to evacuate a number of people from houses, in the worst flooding for nearly 30 years.

Amber flood warnings of possible flooding to isolated properties, roads and farmland near rivers were issued to the River Severn at Gloucester, the River Leam, in Warwickshire and the Avon, near Rugby.

The BBC's Jonathan Ledgard: Power cuts have hit 1,700 homes

There were several less serious yellow alerts on rivers in East Anglia, the Midlands, the South and South West and on the River Wye in Wales.

The storms claimed two lives over the weekend. In Somerset on Sunday 51-year-old Mr Anthony Hamblin was killed after gale force winds tore a corrugated iron roof from a building in his home town of Bridgwater, Somerset.

Mr Hamblin was walking along the Bridgwater and Taunton canal when he was hit by the sheet from a shed 50 yards away.

Narrow escape: A woman survived when a tree crushed her car

In West Sussex, an elderly man died when a tree fell on top of him as he played with his grandson in the garden of his house in Bolney, West Sussex.

Robert Bridger, 70, was killed after being trapped beneath a tree blown over by Sunday's gale-force winds.

A 31-year-old woman had a lucky escape in Exeter, Devon, when a tree crushed her car seconds after she got out.