Hundreds of students appeal for flood help

HUNDREDS of students have appealed for financial assistance after a flash flood damaged their rented homes in Athlone at the weekend.

Almost 100 students and more than 20 other households were placed in emergency accommodation after the Willow Park estate was covered by more than three feet of water on Sunday afternoon.

Athlone Institute of Technology students union said up to 700 students are living in rented homes on the private estate, just across the road from the college. Around 80 of them slept in the institute’s campus gym on Sunday night, while emergency services worked to relieve the situation.