Disruption from Storm Eowyn “may continue into tomorrow”, Kate Forbes has warned.
The Deputy First Minister said it was “important that our expectations are managed”. She added the Scottish Government will “keep the public informed” about whether football matches will go ahead this weekend.
People in Scotland have been urged to stay indoors after the Met Office issued a red danger to life warning for wind on Friday.
Trains have been suspended across the country and hundreds of schools are closed after forecasters predicted wind speeds of up to 100mph during Storm Eowyn.
Buses across Scotland have also been widely disrupted and ferries across the country have been cancelled, according to CalMac.
Forbes told BBC Radio Scotland’s Good Morning Scotland programme: “We will obviously focus on recovery tomorrow we hope. That might take longer than we all hope, just because we have to understand the scale of any damage.
“When it comes to the utility companies, they will be doing all that they can to reconnect people where their electricity or their supply has been cut off. The same goes for transport.”
She continued: “There will be some things that are easier to resolve than others. So it is important that our expectations are managed by how quickly things can return to normal and there may well be continuing disruption tomorrow.”
When asked about sporting events tomorrow, Forbes said: “Over the course of today, we will have further Scottish Government’s Resilience Room meetings, and that’s to understand the scale of the impact and to understand and what might come next.
“And we will continue to coordinate with the sports sector, and there will be other sectors that we will continue to engage with, just to understand what their plans are and respond. And we’ll make sure that we keep the public informed about any plans.”
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