Dublin City Council is engaged in a number of projects to identify and protect areas that could be vulnerable to different types of flooding.
According to Tom Leahy, deputy city engineer with Dublin City Council, the city is prone to several categories of flooding.
They are: tidal flooding, river flooding, flooding caused by dam breakages, damage to infrastructure such as burst water mains, and fluvial flooding – as was witnessed in Dublin at the weekend.
According to Met Éireann, an average month’s rainfall fell on Saturday. The agency recorded 76.2mm of rain at its weather station at Dublin airport between midnight on Friday and midnight Saturday, the second highest amount to fall in the capital during a 24-hour period since records began.
Fluvial flooding – also known as “monster rain” - is very difficult to predict according to Mr Leahy, and areas which have combined drainage systems where rain and sewage are carried together are particularly susceptible.
A post incident assessment is being carried out and locations where flooding is likely to take place have already been identified using flood mapping and 3d mapping.
Dublin City Council is actively working with several other European cities in a consortium called ‘Flood Resilience Cities’ which aims to identify how to best defend a city against flooding.
Mr Leahy says the use of sustainable drainage systems such as ditches where storm waters are attenuated at source would allow the controlled release of flood water in an environmentally friendly way.
Meanwhile, Met Éireann is predicting unsettled weather over the next four to six days with heavy rain today providing the potential for local or flash flooding in the Leinster area.
This morning saw heavy downpours in south Leinster and north Munster and the rain is expected to move further into Leinster this evening.
A low-pressure system, currently centred over Ireland, and which is not moving very quickly could result in large amounts of rain falling over a prolonged period of time.