Communities in Mayo continue to be impacted by flooding

EWES, near lambing, found themselves up to their bellies in water after flooding in west Mayo.

Their plight and other impacts in the community were highlighted by Councillor Chris Maxwell at a Westport-Belmullet Municipal District meeting.

He explained how he had been looking at the Woodfield road in Louisburgh in recent days with the council engineer where it had been damaged earlier in the year after the Carrowniskey River flooded. But the day before the monthly council meeting it was submerged again due to flooding.

People in the area couldn't get out to Sunday Mass as their road was impassable.

Had it happened the following day on the Monday, bus operators wouldn't have been able to get children to school.

In sheds there were ewes up to their bellies in water, ready for lambing, he told the meeting.

On the Srahroosky side, a road was done under the LIS two years ago but the man there had to spend €2,000 again on it himself before Christmas, with the work destroyed again.

It is sickening, said Councillor Maxwell, because it's all down to the bushes in the rivers not being cleaned.

“All we want is the bushes cut so water will flow,” he told management about rivers in the district.

A representative from the environment section should attend a meeting to discuss the problem with them and try to find a solution, he suggested.