It’s been an interesting couple of days while Storm Amy worked its way over the island of Ireland and on to Scotland. The worst hit County in the Republic was Donegal but even here in the shelter of County Kidlare there were gusts over 100 hm/h on Friday, and quite a lot of rain as you can see from the first two radar* plots above. Quite a few people, quite reasonably if they were heading towards the weather, went home a bit early on Friday.
Initially the wind was southerly, and it felt surprisingly warm, despite the rain, but by this morning it had veered westerly, the rain had turned to showers, and the wind has now moderated substantially.
I spent some time this afternoon clearing up leaves and small branches that had fallen during the storm, as well as looking for signs of damage. But all’s well. No power cuts either. My big worry however is this tree just outside my house:
It is far too tall for its location, and has been leaning alarmingly for some time. If it topples in the direction it is leaning it will hit my house. I’ve been on to Kildare County Council a few times about it, actually. I don’t want them to chop it down, but I do think they should cut back the upper branches so that if it falls it won’t hit either mine or my neighbour’s house. Unfortunately, they’ve refused to do anything at all. Time for another go at them, I think. It will cost them a lot less to deal with it now than the sum they will have to pay me if serious damage is caused by their negligence.
*In case you’re interested, Met Éireann’s weather radars are located at Dublin and Shannon, and operate at 5.64 GHz (C-band).
In the Dark 