Irish Weather Thread

[thebig C]

I don't know about you guys but I think the past week and a half has been freezing! Real penitrating cold!

[Catmalojin]

Originally Posted by thebig C

I don't know about you guys but I think the past week and a half has been freezing! Real penitrating cold!

Definitely! Though I think it probably feels even colder because we got such a mild October and a very mild November. Compared to this time last year it's positively balmy!

Met Éireann issued this Weather Advisory today:

Issued at 11 December 2011 - 12:01
Weather Advisory

The weather in the coming week will be very windy for a lot of the time with some stormy episodes expected. At the moment, later Tuesday or Wednesday and Thursday night/Friday look to be especially at risk.

Some falls of sleet or snow will occur at times also especially in the North and West.

There is also the risk of some flooding especially along the Atlantic sea board where there will be very high seas and swell coinciding with high tides.

Could be an interesting week ahead!

[Rapter]

Its pity, I was expecting some snow and ice by this time, since a lot of people were saying, that this winter will be colder than the previous one, thought I will finally test out my car on the empty car park when there will be some ice, looks like that will have to wait for next winter

[thebig C]

Hey Catmalojin

True, we have been very lucky until now!! Everybody was predicting mayhem.....I lost count of the number of people who told me (from aparently cast iron sources) that October was going to be snowbound! I'm best man at a Wedding on Thursday, so hoping any bad weather holds off.

Rapter we still have January to get through. When I was a kid that is when most of the snow fell.....so don't lose hope, you may still be able to do donuts Anyway you should be used to the cold being Lithuanian......unless Ireland has softened you up)

[Catmalojin]

From Met Éireann:

Record wave recorded off Ireland
13 December 2011

At 14.00 today (Tuesday 13th December 2011), the M4 weather buoy off the Donegal coast recorded a maximum wave height of 20.4 metres which is the highest maximum wave recorded in Irish waters.

Had a few snow flurries today in Dublin, but none of it accumulated. Very, very windy though!

Today's weather warning:

Issued at 13 December 2011 - 04:18
Severe Weather Alert

Very windy or stormy today with winds gusting 100 to 140 km/h, strongest along the North coast. Squally showers or thunderstorms will give some wintry falls of sleet and snow especially on hills but at some low levels also. The showers will be most frequent in the North and West with blizzard like conditions on some of the hills.

[Catmalojin]

Freezing winter conditions expected to continue through the weekend

LUKE CASSIDY

Thu, Dec 15, 2011


Greyhound-owners "walk" their dog from their car in snowy conditions in the Dublin mountains. Photograph: Dave Meehan

THE CURRENT cold spell, with daytime highs in single digits and sub-zero temperatures at night, is expected to last through the weekend, according to Met Éireann.

Further wintry showers will affect the north and west of the country today but the strong winds experienced over the past few days will slacken.

Outbreaks of rain or sleet are also likely to affect southern coastal counties by afternoon but the rest of the country should remain dry with daytime temperatures of 4 to 7 degrees.

It will be very cold overnight with temperatures dropping to -3 degrees. Rain moving in from the west will spread to other areas tomorrow, with some of the showers turning to sleet and snow and highest temperatures of 3 to 6 degrees.

The outlook for the weekend is similar with chilly northerly winds persisting and temperatures expected to fall as low as -4 degrees on Saturday night, bringing a widespread severe frost and icy patches.

Motorists are warned overnight frost has led to icy stretches on some roads this morning, making driving conditions hazardous.

Noel Brett of the Road Safety Authority has urged drivers to be cautions and to consider postponing journeys unless necessary.

He said road users needed to pay attention to “local weather and traffic reports, be extremely careful and heed any Garda messages in relation to travel”.

Mr Brett added: “We need to be prepared for these severe weather conditions of stormy winds, patches of ice and snow showers.”

He warned commuters to be vigilant for black ice, particularly in sheltered areas.

Meanwhile, Eircom says it is continuing to deal with a high number of faults on its network due to the recent stormy weather.

The company says it is dealing with more than 5,000 reported faults nationally, with the worst-affected areas along the west coast and parts of the northeast.

Eircom said its crews were working as “quickly as possible” to restore service to customers and will work through the weekend if needed.

In Co Kerry, a lightning strike yesterday left more than 1,000 homes and businesses without power. An ESB spokeswoman said repair crews had restored electricity to most of the premises around Kenmare and Cahirciveen. Last night, about 200 houses remained without power.

She added that the recent bad weather had not adversely affected the network.

© 2011 The Irish Times

...

[Catmalojin]

Woke up to a very light dusting of snow here in Dublin this morning!

[Catmalojin]

White Christmas not on the cards as temperatures rise

MICHAEL O'REGAN, PATSY McARDLE and PAT FLYNN

Mon, Dec 19, 2011

MILDER WEATHER returns today, with temperatures expected to rise to between seven and 10 degrees, ruling out the likelihood of a white Christmas.

However, heavy rain this morning could lead to spot flooding in some places, and motorists are advised to drive with care. The rain will clear southeastwards later in the day, giving way to sunshine and scattered showers.

Tomorrow will be cold and frosty at first, but the day will be mostly dry and bright.

Mild weather is expected on Christmas Day and St Stephen’s Day, with dry conditions in most areas.

Icy conditions yesterday and over the weekend made driving hazardous in many places.

Three people were hospitalised after their car skidded into a canal between Cloghan and Shannonbridge in Co Offaly. One of the occupants of the car later died.

Clare County Council has meanwhile defended its decision not to grit the county’s roads on Friday night. There were a series of crashes on Saturday morning, one of which has left one woman fighting for her life in hospital.

The woman in her 40s was critically injured after her car skidded on ice and spun out of control before ploughing into a stone pillar. The accident happened at about 8.30am at Moymore near Tulla on the main Ennis to Scariff road. Emergency services had great difficulty getting to the scene because of the icy conditions.

As many as six accidents were reported on the same stretch of road at about the same time. A council spokesman said: “The council monitors the temperatures very closely and up to 7am on Saturday we had received no warning from Met Éireann or IceCast. We had gritters out on the previous two nights. There had been rain and cloud cover on Friday night and no warning of freezing temperatures.”

“We just don’t know what happened on Saturday morning. It must have been some sort of freak event. The first notification we received of the conditions was at 9.05am when we got three calls from the emergency services,” the spokesman added.

As the freezing conditions continued early yesterday an ambulance lost control and left the road at Clooney a short distance from the scene of Saturday’s accident. Two paramedics escaped injury. There was no patient on board at the time.

Meanwhile, gardaí in Co Cavan have confirmed they are investigating the theft of several roadside salt bins which were provided in the Cootehill area to be distributed by county council workmen on icy roads.

© 2011 The Irish Times

/

[Catmalojin]

Tomorrow may be our warmest-ever Christmas Day
Saturday, December 24, 2011 - 02:01 PM

Tomorrow could to be the warmest Christmas Day ever in Ireland.

Temperatures are expected to reach a record 14C in parts of the east.

It is understood the current record for the hottest Christmas Day was set in 1974 when the mercury hit 13.7C at Dublin Airport.

But forecaster with Met Eireann Joanna Donnelly said temperatures could be even higher tomorrow.

"Today we're looking at 11C or 12C possibly, but tomorrow 11C to 13C generally is expected, and we might hit 14C in parts of the east tomorrow," she said.

Read more: http://www.irishexaminer.com/breakin...#ixzz1hTCYUbwj

Contrast this to last year when Christmas Day temperatures in Dublin hit -15.7ºC!

[Catmalojin]

Hope everyone had a good Christmas!

Warmest Christmas Day ever recorded in both the Republic and Northern Ireland.

From BBC:

A high of 14.3C (57.7F) was recorded in County Down - the mildest Christmas Day on record for Northern Ireland.

The temperature was recorded in Murlough, where the previous record was 13C - most recently recorded in 1988.

The Met Éireann station in Moorepark, County Cork, recorded a high of 14.4ºC and a low of just 10.4ºC.

[Catmalojin]

169km/h gusts at Malin Head this morning.

Provisional 10-minute Windspeed Record for Malin Head
03 January 2012

Provisional 10-minute Windspeed Record for Malin Head

At approximately 5.40 this morning, Jan 3, 2012, our station in Malin head recorded a 10-minute mean windspeed of 68 kts (78 mph, 126 km/hr, 35 m/s), making it a Beaufort Scale 12, hurricane force, wind. This exceeds the previous record for Malin Head of 67 kts, recorded 26 Dec, 1998.

The national 10-minute mean wind speed record of 71kts was recorded at Foynes, Co. Limerick on 18th January 1945.

The station also recorded a gust of 91 kts around the same time, however this does not exceed the Malin Head record of 98 kts, recorded in September 16, 1961.

It must be stressed that these are provisional data.


Met Éireann

[JD47]

Landed in Dublin airport today.
I thought I was going to die because as we were about to land the plane went from side to side and it looked like the wing was going to smash of the ground.
Very windy indeed.

[thebig C]

Originally Posted by JD47

Landed in Dublin airport today.
I thought I was going to die because as we were about to land the plane went from side to side and it looked like the wing was going to smash of the ground.
Very windy indeed.

Hey Mate

Hope you were comming back from somewhere nice?...Crosswinds can be very nerveracking, I have experienced it myself once or twice!

[Catmalojin]

Unseasonal weather leaves wildlife all mixed-up

JOANNE HUNT

Mon, Jan 16, 2012


Daffodils in full bloom at the Croppies Acre on Wolfe Tone Quay. The director of the National Botanic Gardens, Matthew Jebb, says records taken in the gardens showed that plants are now putting out their leaves two weeks earlier than they did 40 years ago. Photographs: Cyril Byrne

ALTHOUGH IT may still be officially winter, above-average air and soil temperatures have brought bird species ravaged by two consecutive cold winters bouncing back, while confused plants think it is spring.

“We’ve had phone calls from people saying they have fewer birds than normal, like robins, blue tits and starlings coming into their gardens,” says Niall Hatch of BirdWatch Ireland. “People are worried that something has happened to them.”

With the mercury though remaining above freezing for most of this winter, natural foraging has been made easy, making bird tables, well, for the birds.

With stocks of Ireland’s smallest and second smallest birds, the goldcrest and the wren hit by two harsh winters in a row, this year’s milder winter should herald a population boost, according to Hatch.

Ireland’s smallest birds, some weighing just five grams, who survived the cold winter of 2009 to lay eggs in the breeding season, faced a second punishing winter in 2010. “There were lots of babies around in the autumn but then a cold winter hit again and it killed most of them off; the sad reality is that most of them don’t survive,” says Hatch.

“This winter, however, has been so mild that a higher proportion than usual of these babies survived and we are seeing these species bouncing back, which is good news.”

It has been a bumper winter for plants, too, with many thinking it is already spring. The director of the National Botanic Gardens, Matthew Jebb, says records taken in the gardens show that plants are now putting out their leaves two weeks earlier than they did 40 years ago.

Visitors to the gardens this week will be rewarded with the sight of the native cowslip in full bloom, a plant that normally flowers at the earliest in March. Cow parsley is flowering too, a native plant that usually doesn’t colour Irish roadsides until March or April.

Jebb says strawberries in the garden are in full flower also. “As far as they are concerned, it’s spring. To have them flower two months ahead shows what an odd year we’ve been having.”

While it is still too early for our annual visitation by swallows, climate change has also brought their arrival date forward. With their peak arrival months being April and May, with a scattering of pioneers sometimes touching down in March, springalive.net, a Europe and Africa-wide monitoring programme, has found that “on average, swallows are arriving two weeks earlier than they did 20 years ago”, according to Hatch.

Met Éireann forecaster John Eagleton says ground temperatures have not been as cold as the past two winters.

“The mean [air] temperature in January would normally be five degrees for Dublin and Cork and now it’s seven for Dublin and 7½ for Cork, that’s 2½ degrees above normal. It will be an early season for daffodils if it goes on like this, that’s for sure.”

© 2012 The Irish Times

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[Catmalojin]

Beautiful photographs.

Northern lights display: Donegal skies transformed

RONAN McGREEVY

Tue, Jan 24, 2012


The Aurora Borealis as captured above the northern shoreline of Fanad Head by local amateur astronomer and photographer Brendan Alexander of DonegalSkies.com


The Northern Lights seen from Urris, Clonmany, Inishowen, Co Donegal on Sunday night. Photograph: Adam Porter.

NATURE PUT on one of its most awe-inspiring shows over north Donegal with a rare glimpse of the Aurora Borealis, better known as the Northern Lights.

The stunning display was seen by thousands of people and captured on camera along the north Donegal coast on Sunday night and yesterday morning.

Amateur astronomer Brendan Alexander captured his photograph during a parting of the clouds on Sunday night when the rain stayed away just long enough to give him a chance to take the images.

The photograph was taken from Fanad Head in northern Donegal between 8.30pm and 9pm on Sundaynight.

The photographer said he used a Canon camera with a 30-second exposure. Mr Alexander had been tracking a solar flare since it was reported by Nasa to have erupted from the Sun’s surface last Thursday. Auroras occur when ionised particles from the sun hit the earth’s atmosphere and react with the gases, in this case oxygen which gives off the red and green colours.

They occur at extreme latitudes because the ions are attracted towards the magnetic poles.

They are not usually seen as far south as Ireland, but this one has. It was due to hit earth’s atmosphere at 10.30pm on Saturday, but it did not come until Sunday morning and the activity levels kept building during the day.

The Kp, or radiation level, which is a measure of how strong the display will be, was between 4.5 and 5, enough for the lights to be seen from Donegal, but it needs a 6 for the view to be seen across Ireland.

Those who missed the Northern Lights on Sunday night may have another chance in the next couple of days.

The sun, which is going through its active phase at the moment, threw off its biggest solar flare for six years yesterday morning.

The flare is travelling at an estimated 6.7 million km/h towards earth.

It is due to hit earth tonight and into the early hours of tomorrow morning.

© 2012 The Irish Times

More photographs:


From 'Donegal Weather Channel' on Facebook.

image hosted on flickr

image hosted on flickr

image hosted on flickr

From 'muckish' over on Boards.ie.

[Catmalojin]

Minor earthquake felt in north Donegal
Updated: 11:41, Thursday, 26 January 2012

A minor earthquake was felt in parts of north Donegal in the early hours of this morning.

The British Geological Survey said the 2.2 magnitude earthquake is not a predictor of another seismic event and there is nothing to worry about.

A number of people reported the event to them, however, the BGS said if it had happened during the day then it is likely that few people would have felt it.

People reported slight rumbling and farm animals were frightened but there were no reports of damage.

This morning's earthquake was not the only natural phenomenon be experienced in the North West this week - with some spectacular images of the Aurora Borealis recorded in our gallery.

Story from RTÉ News:
http://www.rte.ie/news/2012/0126/donegal.html

...

[JD47]

I hope the seas are calm tonight as I have a ferry crossing at 2:30am tonight from Dublin port to Holyhead. Anyone know what to expect.

[thebig C]

Originally Posted by JD47

I hope the seas are calm tonight as I have a ferry crossing at 2:30am tonight from Dublin port to Holyhead. Anyone know what to expect.

Not sure what the Sea Area forecast is but there are heavy rains moving in from the West over the course of the day

[JD47]

Originally Posted by thebig C

Not sure what the Sea Area forecast is but there are heavy rains moving in from the West over the course of the day

The boat was fine and the weather was great in Liverpool but then when I got back today the weather was awful so I went to the races

[JD47]

Is it true that its going to snow tomorrow.
Someone told me we were going to have snow tomorrow.