9am Briefing: Sledger found with head injuries

EMERGENCY services carried out a late night rescue last night when a sledger was found lying in the snow with a head injury.

The 21-year-old man was found at around 11.20pm in Holyrood Park and was taken to hospital.

It is unknown whether he was sledging at that late hour or had sustained the injury earlier in the day, but ambulance crews reported that he had been lying in the snow for at least an hour.

Fears for rambling man

POLICE fear a man seen walking through Livingston waving his arms and talking to himself may have been ill or delirious with hypothermia.

The man was seen walking in the extreme cold weather in a "confused and agitated state", wearing knee length outer clothing thought to have been either a dressing gown or a trench coat.

He was also wearing dark trousers and a dark woollen hat.

The man, who is around 50, 6ft tall and of thin build, was walking westwards on Houston Road, at 4.05pm yesterday. A second sighting occurred 20 minutes later near the junction at Ladywell and Knightsbridge.

Anyone with information about the condition or whereabouts of the man should contact police.

Plans for Forth wind turbines

HUNDREDS of wind turbines will be built in the Firth of Forth under plans given the go-ahead today.

Developers have been granted rights to build huge offshore wind farms in nine locations around the British coast.

Together they are expected to generate up to 32 GW of electricity – the equivalent of 18 new coal-fired power stations and a quarter of UK demand – by 2020.

The Forth development will be carried out by a consortium called Seagreen Wind Energy, made up of Airtricity and Fluor.

Developers will still have to apply for planning permission before they can build the wind farms. Construction is expected to start from 2014.

Weather hits city schools

SEVERAL schools across Edinburgh and the Lothians were set to remain closed today because of the weather.

In the Capital, Balerno High School and special school Woodlands are closed, while Buckstone Primary School is open only to pupils in primaries one, two and three due to heating problems.

A spokesman for the city council said the school's boiler had broken and only part of the school was being heated by portable heaters, with the nursery also closed.

Corstorphine Nursery and St Mary's nursery in Leith were shut, while in Midlothian all schools were expected to remain open today.

All 45 of East Lothian's primary and secondary schools were due to reopen today. Pupils in West Lothian are still on their festive break and are not due back at school until Monday.