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Farmers contacted by the Irish Farmers Journal around the country reported widespread disruption after Storm Ali tracked across Ireland on Wednesday. Met Éireann recorded strong winds including gusts of over 140km/h in coastal areas, and over 80km/h inland.
There were widespread reports of fallen trees, including from a poultry farmer in Co Monaghan who also needed to switch on standby generators as power went out. The wind tumbled the gable ends of his sheds, but fortunately did not cause harm to his broilers. The farmer added that one of his neighbours’ hay barns was blown away. “It’s unusual to see a storm like this in September,” he said.
Ryan Carr, a dairy farmer from Downpatrick in Co Down, said the storm had caused a number of disruptions on his farm. Gales reached up to 108km/h, bringing down branches and trees across the farm and blocking several roads in the area. Power went following morning milking and it was a case of sit and wait to see if evening milking was possible.
In north Co Meath, a power outage saw one beef farmer without water for housed bulls for finishing as the water pump could not operate.
ESB Networks was working to reconnect 186,000 customers across the Republic on Wednesday afternoon, mostly due to trees falling over wires.
In Northern Ireland, NIE Networks reported a peak of 65,000 customers without power as gusts continued to cause new faults while tens of thousands were reconnected. The Northern Ireland utility warned that it would not be able to restore power to all before the night.
The coming days
As weather warnings were stood down in the Republic and later in Northern Ireland on Wednesday evening, attention turned to the next few days.
“Wind wise, tomorrow [Thursday], it looks like there will be light to fresh breezes, but there will be widespread heavy rain from the afternoon through the evening. Conditions are likely to worsen as the day goes on,” Aisling Butler, forecaster with Met Éireann, told the Irish Farmers Journal.
Farmers should exercise caution when repairing roofs, after three fatal falls happened on farms last October alone, the month when Storm Ophelia battered Ireland.
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