This article is from page 13 of the 2014-01-14 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 13 JPG
AMAZING film from CCTV cameras at the playground in Lahinch during the early hours of Monday, January 6, shows massive waves sweep away recycling bins weighing half a ton as the playground disappears under water.
Clare County Council’s Paul Moroney, who monitored the footage explained that no human could have survived the ferocity of the waves and a car would have been crushed with the impact.
The senior engineer with the council’s water department showed the film to county councillors at a special meeting on Friday last in an at- tempt to depict the terrifying weather conditions the people living along the county’s coast were exposed to during the end of December and early January.
Shortly after 3am on the fateful morning a wave dislodged the bottle and can banks weighing 250kg each.
Three minutes before 5am all of the bottle banks were dislodged and moving at speed with the force of a wave across the playground.
Half an hour later the film captured the playground now under water and the final bank – the half tonne back containing wet clothes, being swept across the screen.
Just 20 minutes later, at 5.50am, the playground was full of water with none of the play equipment visible.
Mr Moroney explained that in flood hazard terms the area was calculated to be “extremely hazardous”, “making it hazardous to life”.
Just seconds later a wave took out the streetlights, and even though the cameras kept running the screen was black and the only sound came from an angry sea.