The front garden of a home cut off by floodwaters for more than a month has been designated an emergency landing site in the event a local resident needs to be airlifted to hospital.
A water pump and several hundred metres of fire hose have also been placed on standby in the area so fire crews will have prompt access to equipment in the event of a fire.
A total of five homes at Ballycar near Newmarket-on-Fergus in Co Clare remain cut off with their local road flooded to a depth of more than 2.5m in two locations.
While a similar situation arose in 2008 and 2009, the flooding this year is the worst seen in the area since 1995 and has again forced the closure of the Ennis to Limerick rail line.
One family has already been forced to leave their cottage, which remains flooded. The waters are so deep the area is only accessible by boat or by trekking across fields and gardens.
One local man has to trek through three neighbours’ properties and two fields, climb several walls and through a hole in the hedge with his twins, who are under the age of two.
Funding drought
Clare County Council had committed to resolving the issue following the serious floods of 2009 and had undertaken preparatory works. However, no funding was available at the time to complete the project.
Residents say the water in the area will continue to rise for another few weeks and could take up to a month after that to recede if there isn’t any further heavy rainfall.
Members of Shannon fire service visited the area and have placed emergency firefighting equipment in the area for prompt deployment in the event of a fire.
The garden of one home has been identified as a landing site for the Irish Coast Guard helicopter if anyone requires urgent hospital treatment.
“We have been cut off now since the beginning of February. This happened to us in 2008 and 2009, and the water has reached the road several times in the years since. The locals were promised this work would be done and it wasn’t. It needs to be sorted now,” local man Brian Keogh said.
Clare County Council senior engineer Eugene O’Shea said: “Emergency services personnel have called to each of the houses affected to ensure that smoke detectors are fitted and fire-fighting equipment has been stored locally to ensure that in the event of a fire there would be no delay in responding.”