Sixteen counties placed under orange weather warning

Muireann Duffy

Updated: 7pm

Severe low temperatures are expected overnight on Thursday as another weather warning has taken effect.

The orange alert for low temperatures and ice began at 6pm on Thursday and will remain in place until midday on Friday, covering 16 counties.

Roscommon, Galway, Clare, Cork, Limerick and Tipperary are all included in the alert, as well as Carlow, Kildare, Kilkenny, Laois, Longford, Meath, Westmeath, Offaly, Cavan and Monaghan.

Status Orange - Low Temperature/Ice warning - Updated ⚠️

Extremely cold on Thursday night with temperatures below -5°C expected. Patches of freezing fog will lead to hazardous driving conditions in places also. ⚠️🚗

View all warnings here 👇https://t.co/Xg3aMJlyuS pic.twitter.com/BIAJp04Sgy

— Met Éireann (@MetEireann) December 15, 2022

"Extremely cold on Thursday night with temperatures below -5 expected widely away from coastal areas, leading to severe frost and ice," Met Éireann said.

In some inland areas, overnight temperatures may reach as low as -8 degrees.

"Patches of freezing fog will lead to hazardous driving conditions in places also," the forecaster added.

The orange warning is in addition to a similar yellow alert for the entire country which is also due to remain in place until 12pm on Friday.

The freezing fog is expected to slowly clear on Friday morning, making way for a largely dry and sunny start to the day. However, showers will turn heavy into the afternoon and evening, becoming more widespread as the day progresses.

Temperatures on Friday afternoon are forecast to be in the region of 0 to 4 degrees, before dropping back to between -3 to 2 degrees overnight.

The weekend is set to be marginally warmer, ranging from 1 to 8 degrees on Saturday, when it will be colder in the north of the country.

Sunday will see temperatures back to between 4 and 8 in the north and 10 to 13 degrees in the south