Heavy rainfall leads to flooding fears this winter
Anton McNulty
PEOPLE living in parts of Mayo which have suffered flood damage in the recent past are fearful of repeat occurrences in the coming months – because they say no work has been carried out by the OPW or Mayo County Council to prevent flooding in the future.
In the last number of weeks, rain has fallen at unprecedented levels throughout the country causing many rivers to burst their banks and causing millions of euro worth of damage to property.
While no towns in Mayo have suffered flood damage to this extent, the rain levels which have fallen in the county since the start of the month have led to fears of further flooding. The recorded rainfall at Mayo’s two weather stations, in Belmullet and Claremorris, show that up to August 17 rainfall was well above the monthly average.
The average rainfall in Belmullet for August is 93.5mm and the amount fallen so far is 146.8mm, while in Claremorris 137.9mm of rain has fallen so far this month, with the average at 96.9mm. The amount of rain fallen so far in Mayo for August is well above the average rainfall for any other month of the year.
In the latter end of 2006, homes in areas of south Mayo and Crossmolina suffered severe flood damage and locals living in those areas have expressed concern that if this level of rainfall continues into late autumn, they will suffer further flood damage. Since the incidents, survey work has been carried out by the OPW and Mayo County Council but no remedial work has been carried out.
Cllr Patsy O’Brien, who represents areas of south Mayo which were affected by the rainfall, told The Mayo News that funding had been promised to carry out remedial work but they have yet to receive anything. He said he has asked for funding but has been told there is none and fears that funding for flood damage may now be allocated to other parts of the country.
Cllr O’Brien explained that while he does not expect any houses to be flooded this month, if such high levels of rainfall continue later in the year, he feels there will be a serious threat of flooding.
“There is genuine fear locally that if this rain continues later in the year it will cause more flooding. Not a thing has been done to alleviate those fears in the last two years and the authorities have been ignoring us. We haven’t got a cent from the Government in relation to remedial work to prevent funding and I fear the money will go to other areas instead of us,” he said.
Enda Hiney, whose pub was flooded when the river Deel burst its banks in Crossmolina in 2006, said nothing had been done with the river since then and the threat of another flood is a ‘big worry’.
“We are disappointed that the OPW and the Council have not done anything with the river since the last flood. There has been surveys but there has been no physical work on the river since December 2006, when we were told we would be looked after. There is no problem at the moment but if the level of rain continues into the winter and the level of Lough Conn rises, there is a worry that the river will back up and flood the town again,” he said.
Mr John Condon, Secretary with Mayo County Council, explained that they had a number of workers monitoring the water levels in a number of vulnerable areas. He said the OPW were undertaking surveys of affected areas and were contemplating introducing an early warning system. However, he said there were a number of factors which caused floods which could not be solved by simple engineering.
“This is a difficult situation because there isn’t a simple solution when you are dealing with the forces of nature. It is not always possible to stop it. There are a number of factors which have to happen at once to cause flooding. We have met the OPW who are looking into the situation in Mayo but it is not a simple solution,” he said.
