1m tonnes of sand washed from blue-flag beach in stormy week

Large-scale erosion at a popular, blue-flag beach has been worsened by storms and high tides over the festive period.

There are now fears of flooding to homes and land which had been protected by sand dunes at Rossbeigh Beach on the Ring of Kerry.

UCC engineering experts estimate that a million tonnes of sand have been washed away from Rossbeigh in the past week, in addition to the estimated eight million tonnes that have disappeared since the dunes were first breached by the sea in Dec 2008.