The cool, windy and wet weather during the last couple of days, which marked the end of a warm sunny spell, is set to continue for the rest of the week.
Wind and lower temperatures, more typical of autumn weather, are forecast. Although the gales will abate, it will still be very windy. Heavy showers will return towards the weekend.
Today will be similar to yesterday with strong and gusty north-westerly winds. However, the winds should moderate during the afternoon and evening. There will be a lot of heavy showers, some of them expected to be thundery.
Ms Deirdre Lowe of Met Éireann said: "It will still feel more like autumn with temperatures up to 15 degrees at best, but feeling cooler in the wind when it could go down to 9 degrees."
There will be an improvement tomorrow with moderate west to north-west breezes, she said. It will stay mainly dry with isolated showers, and will be a couple of degrees warmer, at 17 degrees.
However, Ms Lowe said the winds will pick up again on Thursday, and rain will spread across the country on Friday and throughout the weekend.
Thursday will be very breezy with fresh to strong winds which, because they will be coming from a southerly direction, will bring milder air.
Some bright or sunny spells are likely in Leinster and east Munster.
Elsewhere around the country, it will remain cloudy with occasional sunshine and some drizzle, mainly in the west and north.
Throughout Thursday night and Friday, rain will spread eastwards across the country and may be heavy in places. The winds will pick up again, but will still bring milder air.
Heavy showers are expected on Saturday and Sunday, but these may ease again going into next week.
Anne Lucey writes:
A section of road on a major tourist route has collapsed in south Kerry. Engineers blame flash flooding and unusual weather for the collapse of a 10-metre section of the Ring of Kerry between Sneem and Castlecove.
Mr Paul Neary, the county council's senior executive engineer in the area, said the continuous rainfall in Kerry over the weekend and intense localised deluges were responsible.
Mr Neary said he expects that traffic will be reduced to a single lane for some time.
Gardaí in Cahirciveen appealed to motorists yesterday, including Ring of Kerry buses, to avoid the route for some hours.
Mr Dan Galvin, the county council foreman in Castlecove, said the terrain, not far from the coast, was mostly bog and rock and a nearby section had collapsed five years ago.
At that time remedial work was carried out, which included the need for lorry loads of trunking.
The ring in south Kerry is a very busy road, carrying over 70 large coaches a day for much of the summer, and it needs major upgrading, he said.
It is the second instance of road collapse on a tourist route in recent weeks in the Kerry and west Cork area.
In mid-August, a section of mountain road between Kilgarvan in south Kerry and Bantry in west Cork collapsed following localised torrential rainfall. There were large landslides and rockfalls over a mile-long stretch.
That road has now reopened, but some repair work on culverts remains to be carried out. The cost of the roadworks will run to well over €100,000.