DUBLIN CITY Council staff were last night busily preparing flood defences to limit the damage of bad weather predicted by Met Éireann.
A convoy of lorries packed with sandbags, and men clad in fluorescent jackets putting them in place, was the focal point along an increasingly windswept Sandymount seafront late last night.
The coastal area along the Beach and Strand roads were the main focus of the council's defence efforts.
"We have 130 one-tonne bags, 4,000 smaller sandbags and four huts here along the seafront with about 500 more bags in each of them if we need more," said one council staff member.
"We've also put flood barriers up along the seafront wall here to try hold back any water that might spill over later tonight . . . We'll be on duty until about 4am," the council staff member said. The men expected high tide to arrive at around 12.45am and, with rain and wind both anticipated, they believed flooding was likely.
Residents of the area said the high tide yesterday afternoon indicated that flooding was a realistic possibility, and with increasing winds and the arrival of rain last night, it seemed like more than a possibility.
Marie Phelan, a resident of Marine Drive in Sandymount, said she was disappointed that defences along her road had not yet materialised.
"Our house was badly hit the last time the area flooded in 2002 and we still suffer from rising damp as a result. I can't understand why there are no sandbags blocking our road yet when it flooded the last time," she said.
Ms Phelan said she did not see any great preparations in place in the area to fight the potential effects of global warming and she called for the barrier wall along the Sandymount seafront to be raised to help fend off future flooding.
Labour Party TD Ruairí Quinn, a resident of the Sandymount area, said he was well prepared.
"I have erected a barrier at the front gate, one at the house, we have some sandbags and a pump that I can use should it get to a high level," he said.
Meanwhile, a group of Welsh rugby fans gathered outside a pub in Sandymount said the possibility of a rough crossing had put them off returning home until later today.
"Since we won the match we have been celebrating fairly hard so a bad crossing would be ideal awful. A night celebrating a good victory never did any harm," said one Welshman.
Meanwhile, high winds were reported in north Cork last night, with fallen trees obstructing parts of the Mallow to Mitchelstown road and the N72 to Fermoy.
