Gales, heavy rain, floods bring disruption

Gale force winds and heavy rains battered the country again yesterday, causing widespread disruption to sea traffic and severe flooding in many parts.

Gusts of up to 130km/h (81 mph)were reported as the bad weather made driving difficult and knocked out power for ESB customers.

The winds were expected to ease overnight and breezy weather is forecast for today, but Met Éireann says Sunday will bring yet more strong winds and rainfall.

"There's no end in sight to this very disturbed spell of weather," a spokesman said. "It's not that unusual, really. Things have settled into a pattern and we're getting storm after storm."

Flights were largely unaffected, with delays at Dublin airport blamed on bad weather at Heathrow.

The ESB said 2,000 homes in Dingle were left without electricity for several hours after power lines were blown down in Co Kerry.

AA Roadwatch said heavy traffic volumes across the country were affected by slippery, greasy roads and high winds. A number of crashes caused delays, especially in Tipperary where a scheduled road closure and a closure caused by a crash forced drivers off the N8 on to a lengthy diversion route.

A flood alert was in place in Ennis, Co Clare, last night as heavy rains and high winds continued throughout yesterday.

Ennis town engineer Tom Tiernan said the alert was in place as the River Fergus rose to near street level. Since parts of the town were flooded in 1995 and 1999, the town council has in place a flood emergency action plan. "We haven't put the plan in place in response to the current bad weather," Mr Tiernan said. "We are not ruling it out and we would hope that the tides would be dropping, but we have had heavy rains all day."

Elsewhere in Clare, ESB crews were out in force to bring electricity back to isolated areas. After lightning early yesterday morning, a number of homes were out of electricity in Inagh, Corofin and Ballyvaughan.

A spokeswoman for the Shannon Airport Authority said flight schedules were unaffected by the storm-force winds.

Several hundred homes in Galway and Mayo were left without power and thousands of acres of land were under water following spectacular thunder showers in the west.

Galway has now experienced 26 consecutive wet days, according to weather statistics, in the county's wettest autumn on record. Last Saturday alone, almost 3.8cm ( 1.5 inches) of rain fell on Galway and over 51cm (20 inches) have fallen since the start of September. The Clare and Shannon rivers have burst their banks in a number of places, turning large tracts of countryside into temporary lakes, and severe flooding has also been reported in the Ardrahan and south Galway areas.

The Abbert and Grange rivers have also overflowed, while in Glinsk a number of households are now reliant on tractor access where the River Suck burst its banks.

Farmers in the Kilconly area had to secure the services of a fisheries boat to bring hay to a number of cows and sheep, marooned on a small area of land.

Driving conditions have been described as deplorable with gardaí issuing warnings to motorists to take extra care because of spot flooding and debris strewn on carriageways.

"In bad weather, motorists should exercise extra caution, journeys should be avoided if, at all possible, in stormy conditions," said a Garda spokesman.

In Limerick, traffic diversions were in place after gardaí and the fire service closed a number of streets adjacent to Condell Bridge due to high winds.

Traffic diversions were put in place in the area around the Shannon Bridge after panels on the new Riverpoint building became loose in high winds.

A 45-metre (150-ft) crane on a nearby construction site started to rotate in the gales but it is understood that gardaí did not have any major safety concerns.

On the southeast coast last night, winds up to 120km/h were experienced along areas from Rosslare and Rochespoint to Dunmore East and Tramore, although little damage was reported.