Thousands of acres of farmland are flooded in the west and frustration is mounting among farmers, who have called for immediate action to be taken to alleviate the situation.
Pat Murphy, Connacht IFA chair, said that there has been no maintenance on the River Shannon and there are little islands on the river bed which are taking the capacity out of the river.
“We need a central authority to respond to these flooding events,” Murphy said. He said that 6,000 acres are flooded.
He said two things need to be done to alleviate the flooding situation along the Shannon.
“There needs to be maintenance on the river, they need to take away the silt that has built up and there needs to be management of the water levels with technology we have. We should be able to manage it so much better. We know when storms are due that they should be able to open the weirs earlier to let water off before the rainfall,” he said.
Murphy said it could be May before some of the land is dried out.
Serious
Roscommon IFA chair Jim O’Connor told the Irish Farmers Journal that the flooding is extremely serious.
“It is excessive rain, but the reality is that we have not had any kind of a decent maintenance programme on the Shannon since the foundation of the Shannon.
“Yes, there has been a little bit of work done on the pinch points, but we really do need to have that stepped up significantly by the State, because the reality is the water cannot get into the Shannon. There’s so much silt and debris there,” O’Connor said.
Read more
Watch: ‘We’ll end up taking the law into our own hands’ – flooded farmer
Calls for aid package for flood-hit farmers
Deluge sees over one foot of rain in parts
Over 50ac of one farm submerged by floodwaters
Thousands of acres of farmland are flooded in the west and frustration is mounting among farmers, who have called for immediate action to be taken to alleviate the situation.
Pat Murphy, Connacht IFA chair, said that there has been no maintenance on the River Shannon and there are little islands on the river bed which are taking the capacity out of the river.
“We need a central authority to respond to these flooding events,” Murphy said. He said that 6,000 acres are flooded.
He said two things need to be done to alleviate the flooding situation along the Shannon.
“There needs to be maintenance on the river, they need to take away the silt that has built up and there needs to be management of the water levels with technology we have. We should be able to manage it so much better. We know when storms are due that they should be able to open the weirs earlier to let water off before the rainfall,” he said.
Murphy said it could be May before some of the land is dried out.
Serious
Roscommon IFA chair Jim O’Connor told the Irish Farmers Journal that the flooding is extremely serious.
“It is excessive rain, but the reality is that we have not had any kind of a decent maintenance programme on the Shannon since the foundation of the Shannon.
“Yes, there has been a little bit of work done on the pinch points, but we really do need to have that stepped up significantly by the State, because the reality is the water cannot get into the Shannon. There’s so much silt and debris there,” O’Connor said.
Read more
Watch: ‘We’ll end up taking the law into our own hands’ – flooded farmer
Calls for aid package for flood-hit farmers
Deluge sees over one foot of rain in parts
Over 50ac of one farm submerged by floodwaters
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