Strong winds and heavy rain from Storm Lilian has hit parts of the UK on Friday, bringing disruption to travel and festivals, with thousands left without power.

Three stages have been closed at Leeds Festival due to strong winds, while Creamfields Festival in Cheshire had to delay opening its gates.

Meanwhile, Northern Powergrid said more than 60,000 customers have been affected by “high levels of disruption” to power supplies.

Some train services were delayed due to falling trees after gusts of more than 70mph swept across the north west of England and Wales early on Friday, before moving eastwards.

A Met Office yellow warning for winds in excess of 75mph had been issued across parts of northern England, southern Scotland and Wales until 11:00 BST on Friday.

The Met Office has issued a further yellow weather warning for heavy rain on Saturday from 06:00-13:00 BST for much of south east England, saying people should expect disruption and some flooding.

Meanwhile, two yellow weather warnings for rain were in place in parts of south-west and eastern Scotland overnight until 09:00 BST on Friday, with the potential for some localised flooding.

Lilian is the twelfth named storm of the season, the furthest through the list the Met Office has got since it was introduced in 2015.

Gusts of 50-60mph have been recorded widely and winds have reached 72mph at Capel Curig in Wales.

The Met Office said the storm should pass quite quickly, with the strongest winds forming initially across “parts of north Wales and into the Liverpool, Blackpool area”, before moving over the Pennines and into eastern and north-east England.

Leeds Festival said in an update on Friday that an end to the high winds was “in sight”, but it would not be opening its arena at 11:00 as planned.

They added that due to severe weather, there will be no performances on the BBC Radio 1, Chevron and Aux stages on Friday.

Creamfields Festival warned there would be delays to public arenas and gates opening but it expected the winds to pass by mid-morning.

University student Carrie Gill, 19, described it as the “worst day ever”.

She said she had seen “people’s tents in the sky”, adding that her own had flooded with rainwater and had to be replaced.

Tegan Mcivor told the BBC how she and her partner became a “bit lost” on the way to the festival after road signs were knocked over by the wind.

“I’m pregnant and I’m hoping the wind doesn’t blow the tent away,” she added.

Northern Powergrid – which supplies electricity to the north east of England, Yorkshire and northern Lincolnshire – says it has managed to reconnect more than 27,000 of the 60,000 affected customers.

“Our main priorities are to deal with emergency situations as quickly as possible, supporting our customers and ensure our people can work safely as soon as the conditions allow,” said Louise Lowes, its director of customer service.

A Network Rail spokeswoman said it was closely monitoring the “potential impact” the storm might have on the rail network.

On Friday morning, National Rail reported travel disruption due to trees blocking the line in many parts of the country. It later said many services have returned to normal.

A Transport for Greater Manchester spokesperson said some Metrolink tram lines had been suspended after “a number of trees” were brought down by the storm.

British Airways cancelled 14 flights scheduled to take off from Heathrow on Friday morning and delayed others due to strong winds.

The airport said it would be “operating as normal” and was not worried about further effects from the weather.

The severe weather was also felt outside the expected areas, with the M48 Severn Bridge in Gloucestershire earlier closed due to strong winds.

National Highways said on Friday afternoon that the bridge was back in service in both directions.

Merseyside Police issued a warning to drivers on Friday morning, urging them to take care and “avoid exposed stretches of motorway”.

Motorists were also advised of possible disruption on the M6 motorway, A66 and A1.

Winds are expected to calm over the bank holiday weekend, although wet weather is set to continue.

Storm Lilian is more typical of an autumn storm, not something we usually see in August (though we did have two named storms last August as well – Antoni and Betty).

Lilian is a deep area of low pressure that formed quite rapidly on Thursday night.

In meteorology, low pressure systems are the ones that give us the wet and windy weather.

The lower the pressure, the larger the pressure gradient is around its centre and it’s this that brings the stronger winds.

On a pressure chart, that is visualised by the white continuous lines. The closer they are, the windier it is.

These areas of low pressure have been directed to us by a fast wind high in the atmosphere flowing across the Atlantic. This wind – the jet stream – can either strengthen or weaken weather systems at the Earth’s surface.

Over the last few days, the jet stream has been particularly active, bringing the remnants of ex-hurricane Ernesto to our shores as well as creating Storm Lilian.