The entire island of Ireland is subject to warnings of severe wind into the early hours of Friday morning.
Met Éireann issued a yellow warning of severe conditions across Ireland from 5am on Thursday to 2am on Friday.
“Westerly winds will be very strong and gusty today, in the west at first, progressing eastwards in the afternoon, reaching storm force at coastal areas of the northwest,” it said.
It came with warnings of potential downed trees, power disruption and travel delays. The UK Met Office issued a similar alert covering Northern Ireland.
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A status yellow warning was also issued for gale conditions around the Irish coast, lasting until 8am on Friday.
The forecaster had earlier issued two weather alerts for Co Donegal – a yellow rainfall warning valid until 2am on Friday and an orange wind warning valid until 8pm on Thursday.
It also warned of potential disruptions on travel due to the winds as well as power outages and fallen trees. ESB’s power check service reported multiple outages nationwide on Thursday via its PowerCheck site, the majority of which were in western counties.
A status orange marine warning for storm force 10 winds remains in place between Slyne Head, Co Galway and Rossan Point in Co Donegal.
So far this winter, there have been no named storm events. On Monday, Met Éireann forecaster Brandon Creagh said there was no indication that a named storm was on its way which would give rise to orange level wind and rain warnings.
