Edinburgh cancels New Year’s Eve street parties and fireworks due to storm warning
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Hogmanay festival organisers cancel outdoor events with high winds and rain predicted to hit city in coming days. Edinburgh’s New Year’s Eve street parties and fireworks display have been cancelled on safety grounds because of storms forecast for the next 36 hours.
The city’s Hogmanay festival organisers said the high winds and rain predicted to hit the city made it unsafe to hold any of the outdoor events planned for Monday and Tuesday nights. Those include the fireworks display from the castle, a concert in the gardens underneath the castle headlined by Texas and the street party along Princes Street. Indoor events including a concert headlined by Idlewild and a candlelit concert at St Giles’ Cathedral will go ahead as planned.
“We know that this will be hugely disappointing to all hoping to celebrate Hogmanay in Edinburgh and that people travel from around the world to be here at the home of Hogmanay,” the organisers said. Blackpool council in north-west England said it had also taken the “tough decision” to cancel its fireworks display after the Met Office issued a number of weather warnings for most of the country until Wednesday.
Scotland is experiencing “fairly persistent rain” and snow, with a warning in place until midnight on New Year’s Eve. Rainfall of 50-70mm is widely expected, with 100-140mm in some places, with an amber weather warning for parts of the Highlands and Moray.
