London floods: Streets submerged again as torrential rain triggers more flooding

London and other parts of the UK faced flooding once again as torrential rain triggered Met Office weather warnings.

Public transport services were affected in the capital, while footage shared on social media showed cars driving on submerged roads in Battersea and Tooting in southwest London.

Two London Underground stations, Stepney Green and Holborn, shut due to the flooding, and a platform at Liverpool Street Station was closed off.

Sadiq Khan, the mayor of London, said emergency services had responded to flooding incidents across the city. “[The] main areas affected are Lambeth and Walthamstow,” he wrote on Twitter.

The London Fire Brigade said it responded to about 50 incidents related to the flooding during an “intense” spell between 10.30am and noon.

Domestic flooding caused by rainfall was among the problems the brigade dealt with. It was called to areas including Leyton and Wimbledon as well as Lambeth and Walthamstow, a spokesperson told The Independent.

It is the third time within weeks that London has been hit with flash flooding, and experts have warned climate change is likely to make such extreme weather more common,

The Met Office said that torrential rain would continue to affect the southeast of England throughout the day. There were also warnings of heavy rain, thunderstorms, flooding, lightning, cold winds and hail in central and southern Scotland, northern England and Northern Ireland for the weekend.

But forecasters said a drier, sunnier summer could be possible by the end of the month, with a “hotter spell” predicted.

Becky Mitchell, a Met Office meteorologist, told the PA news agency: “It’s going to stay quite changeable at least for the next week, but as we head towards the end of August, there’s a likelihood we’ll see a hotter spell and drier more settled weather across the whole of the UK.”

Although it is too early to predict temperatures at this stage, it could “potentially be in the high 20s”.

Ms Mitchell said that even though it may not seem like it, this summer has been “warmer and drier than average”.

She said: “It’s not been wetter on average, but we’ve seen a lot of reports on the news about flooding. That’s why it may feel like a bad summer, with not much warmth or sunshine.”

She explained the only exception had been the southeast of England, which has been wetter than usual and has already had 111 per cent of its average rainfall for the summer.

Ms Mitchell said the cause of the torrential rain and thunderstorms is down to the fact that July was so hot.

The worst-hit places appear to be the City of London, which has had 143 per cent of its average rainfall this summer, the Isle of Wight with 174 per cent of its average summer rainfall, and Surrey with 126 per cent.

Ms Mitchell believes the Isle of Wight will only get rainier and imagines the percentage will be “much higher by the end of summer”.

By comparison, Scotland has only had 38 per cent of its average rainfall, and Ms Mitchell said “a few northern areas have been much, much drier”.