Met Éireann has begun recruitment of experts to develop its future national flood forecasting centre in collaboration with the Office of Public Works (OPW), executives from the two agencies told the Irish Farmers Journal.

Met Éireann is currently hiring and training hydro-meteorologists, while the OPW is beefing up its own unit tasked with participating in the National Flood Forecast and Warnings Service.

“We’re building capacity that we didn’t have in Ireland,” said Sarah O’Reilly, assistant director at Met Éireann.

By the end of 2021, the first phase of the new service will deliver a regular flooding forecast and send alerts and guidance to local authorities to help them prepare for the impact of floods such as those that hit farms, homes and businesses in the east and in the northwest this year, or the banks of the Shannon two years ago.

“Individual farmers won’t get a flood forecast for each field after these five years, but maybe after 10 or 15 years,” O’Reilly said, with further development phases planned after the service opens.

Following preparatory work since a Government decision to establish a flood forecasting centre in January 2016, the experts currently being recruited will develop a monitoring system centralising all readings currently being taken on Ireland’s water bodies.

Jim Casey, head of the OPW’s hydrology and coastal section, said they would then develop computer models including weather data to forecast flooding risks on a daily basis.

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