Storm Imogen has been officially named by Met Eireann

The met office have yellow warnings in place for strong winds in the south and south west and heavy rain in the north west and south west Scotland

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/public/weather/warnings/#?tab=map&map=Warnings&zoom=5&lon=-3.50&lat=55.50&fcTime=1454889600

Thought it would have to be named as could be quite a nasty one certainly the worst so far this winter for England. 

Beeb/Meto going for 90mph in the English Channel Midday Monday.

Certainly looks very rough, roughest in these parts for some time

Quite a large area under an Amber warning now for Monday. The storm hits Monday morning rush hour for many so couldn't be worse timing. 

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/public/weather/warnings

I was expecting that to be a bit further North

I think it will be expanded again later today or early tomorrow. Could be a headline maker this one mainly because of the unfortunate timing.

No warning out yesterday for BANES. Only Cornwall Devon and Wales.   Now it is different For BANES .  Yellow then Amber warning for Monday. Wind will be stronger from 18::00 and gathering strength through the night.  

The Met Office has just updated the Amber wind warning for tomorrow to cover a wider area including the whole of the Bristol Channel and the Sussex and Kent coasts.

The yellow warning has also been extended north slightly across more parts of Southern England and Wales.

Latest on Imogen from the Met Office blog page 

http://blog.metoffice.gov.uk/2016/02/07/storm-imogen-brings-gales-to-southern-areas-of-britain/

She looks like a real b*tch of a storm

I think my dodgy garage roof is done for

Does have shades of that Great Pre Christmas Windstorm of December 2013, as in being strong and long lasting. However, the 2013 one was associated with explosive cyclogenesis occurring off to the north west of the UK thus resulting in gale-force southerlies across the whole of the UK, whereas this one is tied in with a fairly modest and quite "old" low pressure system but is travelling directly over the UK producing a tight pressure gradient via an elongated trough while over Wales and Southern England. Or that's how I'm seeing it. 

Should be a higher Severn Bore tomorrow morning!

Let's hope the Met Office are following the precautionary principle here and their predicted wind speeds at the top end of the likely outcomes. Then, fingers crossed, storm Isobel may not be quite as damaging as feared.

The predicted wind gusts for tomorrow display a notable case of coastal divergence, as direction of the wind is slightly more from the SW across the land (frictional effects). I wonder just how far inland that will actually extend though - you can clearly see how the spacing of plot points determines the inland limit.

For me it could make the difference between a near 60 mph gust peak and a near 70 mph peak, which is substantial in terms of the destructive potential of the wind gusts, as this scales exponentially with speed.

There is something else at play in terms of the very highest wind gusts though; a funneling effect as you look east from the Bristol Chanel. This can be seen on the 12z WRF-ARW and it's notable how much more of a drop-off there is as you move across from west to east.

Could see the 100 kph threshold surpassed in CS England, which doesn't happen often from westerly winds (SW winds - ahead of a low coming in S of Ireland, for example - tend to be strongest).

I wonder how well the models capture convective wind gusts. Given the expected squally showers, 'freak gusts' are possible for an unlucky few which could be 5-10 mph higher than the majority.

went down to hartland quay this evening, the swell is really beginning to pick up, sets upto 15ft starting to roll in, blown out by gale force onshore winds.  tomo evening looks to be memorable with 30ft wave heights coming in and a higher tide, all blown in on force 10-11 winds.

flood warnings now issued for coastal locations around the southwest, stating exceptionally large and high energy waves.

bring it on.......

Image is shaping up to be quite a nasty beast. The wind strength is fairly bad as these things go but the main talking point IMO is the longevity of the high winds. Gusts are bad enough but hours of sustained winds can be equally very damaging as they weaken trees and structures over time. I used to live on the Isles of Scilly and they're used to a gale there but my brother who still lives there says there's a fair bit of concern tonight. The automated forecast is above storm force for nearly 12 hours which is unusual - it tops out at an average wind speed (not gusts) of 58mph. In my experience the automated wind speed often underdoes the wind speed so it could be a very wild day in the islands tomorrow especially with  large (though thankfully not spring) tides. I'll post some photos of my brother sends me some.

You can track the synoptic progress of the low on this site. Updates every hour and is based on a blend of obs and hi res output:

http://www.met.ie/latest/marine-analysis.asp

Torrential rain, damaging gusts and a big flash of lightning here in Southampton, glad I'm not out in it!