Calm after the storms: high winds to be followed by milder weather across UK An engineer repairs an overhead powerline near Cumbernauld in Scotland after fierce storms battered Britain. Photograph: Danny Lawson/Press Association High winds returned overnight to the UK but with speeds much lower than those of Tuesday's storm, and ushering in a period of brighter and calmer weather. Repairs by hundreds of engineers have reconnected all but a handful of some 50,000 properties cut off in the UK and Ireland as the earlier gales peaked with gusts of up to 106mph. One of the two fatalities of Tuesday's storm was named as builder Christopher Hayes, 51, a father of three whose van was crushed by a large beech tree which was blown down in Tunbridge Wells, Kent. He was taking a break from work with a colleague who was saved, according to neighbour Gary Heasman, because he bent down to pick up a lighter just as the tree struck. Heasman told BBC TV's South East Today: "Me and a friend ran out there. We wasn't expecting to see anyone in the van but there were two people and one was trying to get out. We just did our best to get him out. We tried to pull the door open but we couldn't do that so we just went back to the van and got a crowbar out and smashed the side window and pulled him out. He was in a panicked state, like you would be. Hayes had run his business for 30 years and been married for 26. A spokesman for Kent police said his wife, son and daughter were "coming to terms with the sudden and unexpected loss of a loved partner and father." The Meteorological Office forecast that "unsettled" weather would continue to cross the British Isles for the rest of the month, with a milder spell likely before colder conditions returned towards the beginning of February. Local councils remain on the alert for possible snowfalls later in the year, recalling that the worst winter of modern times, in 1947, did not begin until 21 January and lasted until mid-March. The Scottish transport minister, Keith Brown, is visiting a salt store in Aberdeen to check stocks and thank staff. Snow is forecast on high ground in Scotland for much of the rest of the month. He will be shown stocks running at 800 tonnes, with room for another 200 if conditions deteriorate. The depot is run by Aberdeen city council and is crucial to keep major roads in that part of Scotland open in severe weather. Another victim of the storm has been the historic 18th-century windmill at Avoncroft museum of historic buildings near Bromsgrove in Worcestershire. One of its sails snapped off and broke through the roof of the postmill, one of the last of its kind in the West Midlands, causing £5000 damage. The storms failed to deter retired printer and grandfather Roy Young, 67, from camping on Christchurch seafront in Dorset for the last five nights. He is first in line for a long lease which has become available on two of the resort's coveted beach huts.