German traders feared the wurst as they battened down the hatches and closed their market in the face of strong winds and stormy weather.

The traditional Christmas market set up in Kingston’s historic market place shut down on Thursday, December 8, after fears were sparked that severe weather could be dangerous for shoppers and traders.

Town centre managers Kingstonfirst have rented out the trading space to GB Events Group, who run the German style market, for the festive period.

GB Events Technical support manager Rafael Mattpa said: “We just closed last Thursday. The main problem was the very strong winds, there’s always the danger that things will fly away and hit someone.

“We had the weather warning two days before but we wanted to see how bad it was and in the course of the day we shut because we decided it was too dangerous.”

Despite further weather warnings and forecasted winds of up to 70mph expected to batter the UK the market organisers were hopeful the attraction would stay open until Wednesday, December 28, as planned.

Mr Mattpa said: “We think it will just be rain this week so hopefully it will be open as normal this week.”

A Kingstonfirst spokesman said it is the responsibility of the events group to decide if and when they open the market.

The market has returned to Kingston for the seventh year running and when running normally is open from 10am to 8pm.