Bridges and quay walls to be checked when flood abates

CLEAN-UP OPERATION:BRIDGES AND quay walls in Cork will have to be thoroughly checked to ensure they are safe when the current flood levels in the river Lee abate, warned Cork city manager Joe Gavin as the city and county began counting the cost of the worst flood in over 50 years.

The clean-up operation began over the weekend. Both Cork City Council and Cork County Council said it was far too early to try and put a figure on the damage, but the bill is expected to run into hundreds of millions of euro.

However, there was no repeat of Thursday’s deluge when 51.2mm of rain fell in a 24-hour period. Yesterday ESB Lee stations plant manager Liam Buckley confirmed that flood waters upstream of the Inniscarra dam were starting to recede.

Mr Buckley said the ESB was now discharging water from Inniscarra at a rate of less than 250 tonnes per second – down from a peak of 535 tonnes per second on Thursday night when water was entering the 306sq mile Lee Valley catchment at a rate of 800 tonnes per second.

Mr Gavin confirmed that Cork city council engineers would begin assessing the 22 bridges on both the north and south channels of the river Lee after the flood waters demolished a section of the quay wall at Grenville Place.

Council staff had worked through Friday night and Saturday morning to secure the road at Grenville Place after the river eroded over a metre of roadway. Council engineers supervised the installation of 2,000 tonnes of rock armour, which stabilised the area.

Cork City Council staff were also forced into urgent emergency repair work on a section of wall at Sunday’s Well when it collapsed into the north channel of the Lee. A road also collapsed on Model Farm Road, again due to the flooding.

Cork County manager Martin Riordan similarly confirmed that council staff would begin an assessment on bridges throughout the county as a matter of priority once flood waters abate on the Lee, the Bandon, the Blackwater and their tributaries.

One bridge over the river Bandon at Murragh had been washed away and given what had happened in Cumbria where a bridge was washed away, the council would have to check all bridges in the county to see if they had been damaged in any way, said Mr Riordan.

Up to 40 schools catering for an estimated 10,000 pupils are expected to remain closed in Cork city this week after local authority and public health experts advised any schools left without water to close until supplies have been restored.

It is estimated that between 15 and 20 primary schools and some 12 secondary schools on the north side of the city could be affected, while a further 10 primary and secondary schools on the south side could also be without water.

Mr Gavin was supported in his advice to schools to close by the Health Service Executive’s southern director of public health, Dr Elizabeth Keane, who said it would be unsafe for any school to continue to operate without a water supply for sanitation purposes.

Dr Keane said it was important that people should continue to hand wash irrespective of whatever difficulties they may be experience with water supplies due to the flooding crisis in order to prevent the spread of the swine flu.

She said it was extremely important that people would continue to either hand wash or use wipes to prevent the spread of the illness, which has to date claimed 16 lives in the Republic and 13 lives in the North.

“Hand washing is going to be more difficult because of problems with the water supply but it’s important that people continue to do so because of the flu pandemic. People should use bottled water or water from a tanker or wipes or a sanitiser,” said Dr Keane.

Dr Keane also urged people to conserve water and pointed out that people can use rainwater or recycled water from dishwashing to flush their toilets and that it isn’t necessary to flush the toilet after every use, particularly after urination.