The Glandore area of west Cork experienced over 60mm of rainfall overnight, leading to localised flooding of farmland and roads, dairy farmer Denis O'Donovan told the Irish Farmers Journal.

O’Donovan said: “Late last night it was very humid and thundery, I had an eerie feeling and a strong suspicion of what was to come. There was no wind and the rain just fell straight out of the sky.

“The rain started at 3am this morning and it was ferocious, I couldn’t sleep with the noise. I got up at 6am this morning to check our rain gauge and found it overflowing. I have never seen 50mm of rain fall in three hours and I wouldn’t like to imagine how long it had been overflowing for.”

Total carnage

After emptying the rain gauge at 6am, O’Donovan found an additional 11mm had accumulated by 8.30am.

“I decided to go for a drive this morning to check the situation and found that no gully or stream was able to deal with the level of rainfall, it was total carnage.

“You need a jeep or a tractor to pass most roads, with huge craters forming overnight.

"To my surprise, the flooding was concentrated to a very small area. We farm in Glandore, half way between Clonakilty and Skibbereen, and the roads are bone dry 10 miles away in both directions.”

O’Donovan expects the flood waters to subside early on in the day.

“The fields are wet this morning, but were able to handle the rain, the ground was hard and dry beforehand which helped.

“The cows are still out, with minimal damage to the fields, apart from a bit of tracking around the gaps. There will be a lot of damage to the roads. Hopefully the council will be out soon to patch them up.”

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