Swathes of northern and eastern England wake to dusting of snow

A blast of late winter weather has brought snow flurries to many parts of the North of England and the Midlands.

Towns as far south as Norwich reported waking to a smattering of snow on Tuesday morning, with areas including Staffordshire, Yorkshire, Lincolnshire and the North East also reporting wintry showers.

There was no repeat in England of the more significant snowfalls seen in parts of northern Scotland on Monday but forecasters have warned that thundery showers could bring localised hail storms and more wintry weather later on Tuesday.

Met Office meteorologist Alex Burkill said: "We are going to see plenty of showers. They could be intense at times and, as a result, that will bring the risk of something wintry, even though temperatures are set to climb a little bit as we go through the day."

He said: "The further north you are, the better chance you've got of catching a shower and a greater chance of any shower turning wintry. But you can't rule it out further south."

Mr Burkill said Wednesday will be the last day of the cold snap, with temperatures rising towards the end of the week.

And he said snow at the end of April is unusual but not really that rare, with showers on April 26 as recently as last year.

He said: "It is fairly uncommon but we have seen events like this before.

"You only have to go back as far as last year - we had snow as late as this time."

The Met Office had a yellow warning in place for snow in parts of northern and eastern Scotland on Tuesday morning but this was due to expire at 9am.

Mr Burkill said night-time temperatures continue to be cold but not record-breaking with Redesdale Camp in Northumberland seeing the lowest recorded levels on Monday night at minus 4.1C (24.6F).