Significant flooding in Co Wexford leads to road closures

Significant flooding in Gorey and Courtown in Co Wexford on Thursday evening resulted in several roads being closed.

Wexford County Council warned that some roads were impassable due to the flooding and that water had entered some business premises.

“Throughout the evening emergency crews and up to 10 fire tenders, including two from Wicklow, have been working to try and relieve the worst affected areas,” a statement from the council said.

🛣️Link road from Courtown Road to M11 impassable still and likely to remain closed until tomorrow.#StaySafe #Wexford pic.twitter.com/cd5j6ewojM

— Wexford County Council (@wexfordcoco) November 3, 2022

Meanwhile, gardaí issued a traffic alert for some roads in the county. The M11 between Junction 22 and Junction 23 were closed in both directions due to flooding.

Photos on social media showed cars partly submerged in inches of water on some roads in the county after the flooding.

The M11 north and southbound has since reopened, however, the link road from Courtown Road to M11 remains impassable and is likely to remain closed until Friday, the council said.

Flood damage

Eamon Hoare, the council's director of services, said it could cost “hundreds of thousands” of euro to repair the damage in the Gorey area.

He told RTÉ’s Morning Ireland that 16 roads were flooded, five of which were completely blocked when 20mm of rain per hour fell for a number of hours.

The heavy rain led to four business premises and two homes experiencing flooding and there will be damage to roads, he warned.

The downpours, which were contained to the Gorey area, had not been expected to be as bad, he said.

So far this year there have been four such events with €5 million spent on repairing roads and bridges damaged in flooding last Christmas, Mr Hoare said.