The upcoming week sees Ireland prepping for Storm Ashley, the first significant storm of the season. Clare, Donegal, Kerry, Leitrim, Galway, Mayo, and Sligo are the seven counties under Met Éireann’s status orange wind warnings. The predictions forecast potent and gusty winds moving from south to southwest, along with high spring tides, according to the weather service.
From 10am Sunday until 9pm, the warning will be in effect, with wind speeds potentially reaching up to 120km/h. The meteorologists have expressed concerns about possible damage to electrical lines and structures already weakened by previous weather conditions.
For these seven counties, there are fears of impacts such as coastal flooding, large waves near the shore, displacement of unsecured items, fallen trees, dangerous travel circumstances, and treacherous sea conditions.
The rest of Ireland has been put under a status yellow wind warning from midnight tonight until 3am on Monday. Also, much of the southeast is under a status yellow rainfall warning this morning, with spot flooding being a potential hazard.
Altogether, marine storm and gale warnings have been issued across Ireland. The west coast, stretching from Malin Head to Valentia, is under orange alerts. Carlow Weather, a longstanding Irish weather observer, has warned about the deceptive calm after the initial rain and insists that more threats lie ahead with the orange warnings set to be enforced from 10am.
Parts of southern and western Ireland are already experiencing power outages. Several hundred residents in the south and west woke up with no power on Saturday, according to the ESB Network’s fault map that highlighted outages across Clare, Limerick, Cork, Tipperary, Galway, Mayo and Donegal among other places.
Westport in Mayo saw 112 power outages while over 300 people were without power in Ardnaree, as per ESB Powercheck. Meanwhile, around Foynes in Limerick, over 600 power outages were reported. The towns of Midleton, Mallow and Castlelyons in Cork have also been affected.
Emerging from the western North Atlantic on the southern side of the Jet Stream, Storm Ashley is the inaugural named storm of the season, which is between September and September, as disclosed in Met Éireann’s observation.
There were projections for significant intensification as the storm journeyed across the Atlantic, veering towards the north part of the Jet Stream as of late Saturday. This incident is happening at an inconvenient time when the tides are already at an elevated level.
Liz Walsh, a meteorologist, cautioned that the coinciding factors of abnormally high spring tides, forceful winds, and large waves significantly heightens the coastal flooding danger, particularly on the Atlantic coastlines.
In anticipation of the prospective risk of coastal flooding this morning, certain coastal roads and facilities in Galway were pre-emptively shut down.
The storm and the high tide have collided from 6.30am to 8.30am and are forecasted to clash again at 6.30pm.
On Saturday night starting from 10pm, Salthill Prom stretching from Seapoint mini-roundabout towards Galway Business School up to Grattan Road from Seapoint Road to the crossway of Claddagh Quay and Fr Griffin Road, were shut off. Additionally, The Dock Road, incorporating Spanish Arch, Merchants Road, and Wolfetone Bridge, were also sealed off throughout the night.