Met Éireann issues alert for over 30mm of rainfall

Heavy rain fell on Dublin again this evening, hours after Met Éireann issued a warning that more than 30mm could fall in a six hour period.

The orange alert covers Dublin Cavan, Monaghan, Donegal, Longford, Louth, Westmeath and Meath. It said very heavy and thundery showers in Ulster and north Leinster would continue this evening.

The warning follows heavy overnight rain and thunderstorms last night which left saw flooding in parts of Dublin and Midleton, Co Cork.

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Lightning in Kilkenny last night. Image: Dave Knoximus/ YouTube

Dublin Fire Brigade took around 100 calls through the night and had all units deployed for a two-hour period from around 12.30am. Call-outs were for flooding reports, leakages and automatic fire alarms going off at houses, flats and businesses. A spokesman for the fire brigade said: “We’ve had no rain for 16 days and suddenly a deluge for 16 minutes causes all this trouble.

“There were fire alarms going off all over the city — again caused by the thunder and lightning.” He confirmed there were no injuries as a result of the weather.

Some patients at the Mater Hospital in Dublin were moved overnight when the high dependency unit on the top floor sustained minor roof damage during heavy overnight rains. The damage took place in the old hospital building near the nurses' station.

“ Nobody was injured and a small number of patients have been temporarily reassigned to other beds. All hospital services continue as normal,” the hospital said in a statement.

ESB crews have restored power to thousands of homes after weather related outages. Some 2,000 households in Mullingar, 2000 in Fermoy, 900 in Ballybeg, Co Wicllow as well as customers in Midleton were without power. The vast majority of these outages have been repaired and were due to storm damage and lighthing strikes.

Eoin Sherlock, weather forecaster with Met Éireann, said the heavy downpours were very localised. “On paper, it just looks like it was a wet night, but that rain fell in a very short period of time and it was very intense,” he said.

Nearly 30mm of rain fell at Met Éireann’s station in Glasnevin, north Dublin, overnight — but around 20mm of that came down within an hour. However, rainfall in other areas of the city were merely a fraction of that. “This was very localised,” said Mr Sherlock.

Dublin City Council said its drainage crews responded to a number of minor incidents, including a small number of flooded basements. “There were no major flooding incidents in Dublin city,” a spokeswoman said.

“There was some road flooding which drainage crews attended to but these abated quickly.”

Dublin Fire Brigade earlier spent some two hours pumping out water from the basement of Doyle’s pub on the corner of D’Olier Street and College Green. The fire service was called at about 9.30am to the scene where some two to six inches of water was in the basement after overnight flooding. There were two pumps working at the scene. There was extensive damage in the basement of the pub, according to one of the fire officers at the scene.

A number of houses in the city centre were also flooded with basement flooding in Ballybough and North Circular Road. There was flooding along Victoria Quay.

Flooding was also reported at Trinity College Dublin and on Wexford Street in Dublin last night. The TCD Student Union education officer Jack Leahy last night tweeted a photo of flooding at the front arch. This flooding has since been cleared.

Meanwhile in Midleton householders and shopkeepers are this morning counting the cost after the torrential rain led to flooding in low lying parts of the town.

Shopkeepers at the eastern end of Main Street in the town were worst hit while a number of houses in Ballincurra village just outside Midleton were also badly affected.

Midleton Town Councillor, Ted Murphy explained that the drains and shores were simply unable to cope with the sudden deluge which descended at around 11pm.

“The rain that fell was unreal - we had some thunder about 11pm and the heavens just opened - the shores just couldn’t take the volume of rain that fell,” said Mr Murphy.

“Some of the houses at the bottom of Ballinacurra village must have had six or eight inches of water come in on top of them and of course you know the damage that that does.”

Midleton Fire Brigade assisted householders and business people well into the early hours of the morning as they worked to pump out premises and clear the streets.

Flooding at Newlands Cross on the N7 is causing delays for drivers while the slip road at junction six Castlewarden is impassable to motorists, AA Roadwatch said.

Elsewhere Clery’s department store is closed after overnight rain. Dart services between Bray and Greystones have been cancelled because of lightning damage.

There was also flooding at the N24 Waterford to Clonmel road at Mooncoin, Co Kilkenny but this is receding, according to AA Roadwatch. However it urges care as the surface is still very wet.

There was heavy rain this morning in Wicklow, Mullingar, Tullamore and Navan, AA Roadwatch said. Flooding in Co Clare on the N18 between Barefield and Crusheen Co Clare last night has subsided.

Additional reporting PA

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