This article is from page 3 of the 2011-12-20 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 3 JPG
CHANCES of a white Christmas taking place in Clare this year have melting away with meteorologists now predicting that Christmas Day could be as much as 25 degree hotter this year than it was in 2010.
Temperatures at Shannon Airport reached an Arctic minus 11.7 degrees on Christmas morning last year with the latest predictions now forecasting a balmy 11 to 13 degrees for the big day this year.
The last hope for a white Christmas in Clare would seem to hang on a cold-front which is expected to travel over the country on Thursday. This front is expected to be cold enough to generate some snow but it is thought to be very unlikely that the front will be able to last until the big day arrives.
Despite average temperatures for December currently well below the monthly average – the final 10 days of 2012 are expected to be well above the seasonal average.
“The cold weather over the past week has also brought the mean temperature in Clare down to 5.4 degrees, though this remains considerably lower than the mean temperature of 0.7c recorded in the same month last year.
The mean temperature for Decem- ber is normally a much milder 6.3c. We will see a dramatic rise in temperatures during the last 10 days of December,” said Connolly native and founder of Irish Weather online, Mark Dunphy.
“The total accumulated rainfall at Shannon Airport for December has already almost exceeded the average monthly rainfall of 99mm. This compares to 26mm recorded during the entire of December 2010.”
Clare County Council have also recorded a significant drop in river levels over weekend and have reduced the flooding alert level.
The Cliffs of Moher was also forced to close for a time last week due to high winds.
At 11.30am on Tuesday morning last the risk level at the Cliffs was changed from yellow to red – meaning that visitors were advised not to travel to the Cliffs.