Miscommunication appears to have led to the north been entirely covered in white on social media on weather warnings issued on Wednesday by Dublin.
Met Eireann issued a warning of storms and rain across the 26 counties, but the other six were entirely white, suggesting there was no warning in place.
Status Yellow - Wind and Rain warning for Ireland
— Met Éireann (@MetEireann) December 27, 2023
Very strong and gusty southwesterly winds in conjunction with spring tides, may lead to coastal flooding.
Squally showers, with a chance of thunderstorms, may lead to localised flooding⤵️https://t.co/Xg3aMJm6kq pic.twitter.com/263qNetOX6
This prompted West Belfast People Before Profit MLA Gerry Carroll to comment: “I heard the storm ‘respects the border’.”
Another stated on social media: “Why do you not include the North of Ireland in your reports? Why do you discriminate against the Irish people of the North of this Island are they not entitled to know the weather reports.”
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Met Eireann said it always includes weather from the north in its forecasts, but it is dependent on the Met Office for information on storm warnings.
“We do display the warnings that the UK Met Office issue for Northern Ireland – the fact that that region is showing up in white on the Twitter link simply means that there were no warnings in effect there at that time,” Met Eireann said in a statement.
However, the Met Office said: “Northern Ireland (had) a yellow warning for wind and rain yesterday (Wednesday). Nothing in force for today.”
Several hundred sandbags were deployed across Northern Ireland as a result of Storm Gerrit, the Department for Infrastructure (DfI) reported. The DfI said 211 high priority incidents have been reported since midnight on Tuesday.
There were 148 flooding reports, mainly in the east of region and and around Belfast, and 36 fallen tree or branch incidents obstructing traffic.
There was a status yellow warning for wind and rain on Thursday for Clare, Kerry, Donegal, Galway, Leitrim, Mayo and Sligo.
“Southwest to west winds will be strong and gusty at times. A combination of spring tides, large waves and strong winds may result in some coastal flooding,” Met Eireann said.
The weather in the north on Thursday was for some bright or sunny spells and a few showers, these briefly heavy. The Met Office was predicting fresh to strong west to southwesterly winds, occasionally gale force along the north coast.