A MIXTURE of heavy rainfall and melting snow resulted in parts of Co Cork being placed on flood alert last night, while other parts of the country experienced difficulties due to fresh snowfall.
Residents of Mallow last night hoped barriers that worked well during the November floods would again help prevent flooding. Heavy rain and melting snow in the Boggeragh and Nagle Mountains led to a huge rise in water levels in the Blackwater river.
Cork County Council engineer Aidan Weir warned that people in Fermoy were facing the prospect of a near repeat of the November flooding with Brian Boru Square, O’Neill Crowley Quay, Mill Road and Rathhealy Road all at risk of flooding early this morning. Earlier yesterday, more than 30mm of torrential rain combined with melting snow created localised flooding in Cork city and county.
Business people in Blackpool on Cork’s north side were hit by a flash flood at around lunchtime when a fallen tree blocked a culvert on the Bride river, resulting in some premises flooding to a depth of 2ft. However, Cork City Council staff cleared the obstruction and water levels quickly subsided, though not before they caused damage to a number of premises on Great William O’Brien Street.
Despite the recent thaw, snowfall was reported in parts of Cork, Kerry, Wicklow, Dublin, Wexford, Sligo and Mayo.
AA Roadwatch said this had created dangerous driving conditions in the west and east and that a number of crashes had occurred.
Gerald Fleming of Met Éireann said the snowfall would most likely prove to be a “temporary phase”.
“What’s happening is that there’s a weather front moving up through the country which is meeting cold and turning to snow over higher ground,” he said.
Mr Fleming said the cold spell was petering out and that a warmer, wetter front would move across the country by Friday.
Soldiers from Collins Barracks spent the night filling 5,000 sandbags to protect Skibbereen after a high tide and swollen waters in the river Ilen threatened to flood low-lying parts of the town.
An ESB spokeswoman said it was not anticipating difficulty with water levels at the Inniscarra Dam on the river Lee, but it was monitoring the situation.