Sharing the weather outlook for Thursday, the Met Office said: "Rain and thundery showers over northwest Scotland turning heavy at times. Low cloud and fog are possibly affecting the North Sea coasts. Otherwise, a very hot day with strong sunshine." The thundery weather comes as the country experiences the heatwave conditions with the temperature predicted to soar to 40C in many areas of the UK.

Weather maps from rain showers spread across the areas in Scotland on Thursday evening, with a possibility of isolated rain across Cardiff and Plymouth.

The Met Office said: "An area of thunderstorms moving east across the area will bring a spell of frequent lightning, gusty winds, torrential rain, and a few places, hail.

"The storms will be moving quickly, reducing the potential for widespread large amounts of rain, but there are a few places that could see 20-25 mm of rainfall in a short period in the most active storms, which could bring some brief flooding."

The new thunderstorm warnings come after the Met Office issued rare red extreme heat alerts for dozens of areas. The UK Health Security Agency has issued a red health warning for six regions of England – the West Midlands, East Midlands, South East, South West, London, and east of England – from 1am on Wednesday until 11pm on Thursday. This indicates “a risk to life for even the healthy population” as well as impacts beyond health and social care, with potential effects on transport systems, food, water, energy supplies and businesses.