Heavy rain on way

VERY HEAVY rainfall is expected this weekend, which may bring renewed flooding to water-logged areas.

Met Éireann predicts 20mm to 40mm of rain could fall in some parts over Saturday and Sunday.

The coming weekend is “ominous”, and the south, west and midlands would probably see heavy rain, Vincent O’Shea of Met Éireann said yesterday. These levels “shouldn’t occur widely”, Met Éireann added.

Some 40mm of rainfall would represent two-thirds of the total rainfall for Cork last December.

It could bring renewed flooding in some locations on Saturday and Sunday. While such amounts of rain are not excessive on their own, they will fall on top of wet ground, Mr O’Shea said.

Today will see some showers and there will be up to 10mm of rain tomorrow. Rain is expected to ease later tomorrow or after dark. Drier weather would help floods to subside but it would take a week or two without rain to really dry things out, he said.

Looking 10 days ahead, there was “no sign of any settled weather in the offing”, he said.

November was one of the wettest months ever recorded in Ireland.