Calls for flood alert system to give homeowners and businesses time to prepare

Alert system would have given people 'precious minutes' to act, Midleton Chamber president said

Flooding on Main Street Midleton during Storm Babet. Picture: Eddie O'Hare

A flooding alert system such as a siren could allow a precious few minutes for people in towns like Midleton to salvage and protect their most important items, businesses in the town have said.

Midleton Chamber president Adrianna Hegarty said the worry for people there has not dissipated following the destruction of Storm Babet last month, which left extensive damage to about 250 homes and business premises.

Businesses in the town met this week to discuss payments from the Government's emergency flood relief funding, but also what could be done to improve outcomes until the long-mooted flood defence scheme is put in place.

"There was great worry around Storm Cíarán but we were lucky this time. It is quite frightening to hear for many businesses that another is on the way. When a similar event happened in Bandon some years ago, two weeks later they had it all again.

People are crying out for some kind of alert — on the day, if a siren had gone off, people in their premises and offices could have got their cars, for instance. 

"However, many were stranded and couldn't get home. It would have given a precious few minutes to prepare."

Ms Hegarty said she had asked whether the local authority and central Government could provide financial assistance for homes and businesses with flood gates, an alternative to sandbags, but which can be expensive.

The weekend beginning on Friday, December 8, is being planned as a weekend to showcase the town following the floods.

A campaign has begun to get Midleton "back up on its feet", with one of the most traditional shopping dates on the calendar next month earmarked to bring in visitors from around the county, Ms Hegarty said.

She said while many businesses have since reopened, some are still in the process.

Support from around the region for the traders in the run-up to Christmas will be vital, she said.

"It would be wonderful it we could get people from around the county to visit Midleton in the run-up to Christmas," she said.

Call for managed retreat

It comes as one of the foremost climate change experts in the country has warned "we are fooling ourselves" if the National Coastal Management Plan does not include a managed retreat in the face of rising sea levels and the evolution of the coast.

Maynooth University professor of geography (climate change) Peter Thorne told RTÉ radio’s Morning Ireland that weather events this year had been “gobsmacking”, surprising even climate scientists in their intensity.

A managed retreat would see a relocation of people and buildings from areas that are becoming more susceptible to climate change.

The Government last month published a report from the Inter Departmental Group on Managing Coastal Change Strategy, which was set up in the face of evidence of changing weather patterns and an estimated sea level rise of up to 1m by the year 2100.

Prof Thorne said: "If we had a time machine and we could pluck someone from 1900 and place them in today, many aspects of today's weather would not be recognisable to them. That is scary, and that's just the start of this. Until we cease emitting heat-trapping gases, things will get more and more unusual to that person from 1900.

"We can't defend everything. We can't defend everywhere. And if the final coastal management plan doesn't have a managed retreat, we're fooling ourselves.”

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