Electricity bosses are “very confident” the remaining properties in Scotland without power after Storm Gerrit will be reconnected on Friday.

High winds, heavy rain and snow damaged electricity networks in some parts of the country and some customers spent two nights without power.

Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks (SSEN) Distribution said that as of 11am on Friday, electricity supplies have been successfully restored to more than 47,000 properties, with 450 still off supply.

The company said these localised faults are in small pockets across Aberdeenshire, Perthshire and the Great Glen and are the focus of current repair and restoration efforts.

Graeme Keddie, director of corporate affairs at SSEN, said “hard work” by its staff has reconnected tens of thousands of properties.

Speaking on BBC Radio Scotland’s Good Morning Scotland programme on Friday, Mr Keddie told how SSEN staff had “made a tremendous effort in restoring power to customers affected by Storm Gerrit, battling some very tough weather conditions”.

He thanked those affected for their “ongoing patience” as the power firm makes its “final push” to restore electricity.

Storm Gerrit resulted in a “lot of localised faults” to the power network, Mr Geddie said, adding there were a “lot of points of multiple damage”.

This he said was “down to the ferocity of Storm Gerrit”, adding that wind speeds had been up to 10mph higher than had been forecast in some areas.

He insisted SSEN had been “well prepared” for this latest blast of wintry weather, but added “we saw some wind speeds 5-10mph higher than predicted”.

Winds at Inverbervie, on the Aberdeenshire coast, reached 86mph during Storm Gerrit, he said – adding this was higher than the 78mph winds that hit the town during Storm Arwen in November 2021.

The latest storm was “more ferocious than forecast”, Mr Geddie added.

But he stressed: “We’re very confident of getting all homes reconnected through the course of today.

“We’re got enough people and resource and we are absolutely committed in this final push.”