Britain basks in its second warmest Christmas ever but now Storm Conor batters the North with winds up to 95mph

There is a tale of two halves across the UK today as the south basks in the second warmest Christmas on record - and northerners are battered by hurricane-force winds as Storm Conor hits. Yesterday temperatures reached 15.1C, nearly making it the warmest Christmas ever - beaten only by the 15.6C recorded in Devon in 1920. However the warm weather is not set to last, as temperatures in the south could plummet as low as -6C tonight. Meanwhile Storm Conor is making its way across Scotland, Orkney, the Shetland Islands and Lancashire (left) today, bringing rain, sleet, hail, snow, gusts of 95mph, 46ft waves and temperatures of 0C. And while Cumbria has been blanketed by snow today (top right), residents in Dorset awoke to a bright and sunny scene in Dorset (bottom right).