Public events should be cancelled when a status orange weather warning is issued, with some called off sooner.
That’s among a long list of recommendations contained in a review of the response to Storm Éowyn.
A number of steps are already being taken, including a review of local authority severe weather and flooding plans, and the development of a guide to establish Community Support Centres.
Storm Éowyn was described in the report as one of Ireland’s most dangerous weather events in living memory.
Alan O’Reilly from Carlow Weather says the system needs to change if public events are cancelled under an orange level warning, noting; “For some type of temporary structure events you could argue that but I think the real problem here is that we need to change it to be far more granular if they’re going to do that because we have seen time and time again orange warnings for Cork where one part of the county has a real serious weather event and another part has nothing, pretty much”.
