A Status Orange low temperature and ice weather warning due to come into effect on Tuesday evening has been issued for 22 counties by Met Éireann.
The warning is in place for Munster and Connacht as well as counties Carlow, Kildare, Kilkenny, Laois, Longford, Meath, Offaly, Westmeath, Wicklow, Cavan, and Monaghan.
The alert, which comes into effect at 8pm tonight and lasts until 10am on Wednesday morning warns that conditions will be “extremely cold with widespread severe frost, ice and lying snow.”
Met Éireann has issued an appeal to motorists to take extra care on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday as freezing fog is likely to make for very hazardous travel conditions.
Spokesperson Andrew Doran-Sherlock told RTÉ radio’s Morning Ireland that the current frost and ice conditions are unlikely to change as temperatures will not rise above freezing during the day and will drop to minus 8 degrees Celsius at night.
“There’s going to be severe frosts and icy stretches. Then tomorrow it's going to be a bitterly cold day with highest temperatures not even getting above freezing in some areas. I will be followed by another extremely cold night on Wednesday night with another very cold day on Thursday.
"So really, anywhere that's got frost and ice, there's a good chance that it won't shift through the days. And we've got the other complication, that there's going to be freezing fog developing during the night. And again, that's really not going to shift in places through the day. And that's going to make for very hazardous travel conditions.”
The current Status Yellow warning is likely to become a Status Orange alert later today in some parts of the country, he added. The “wintry” showers, however, will begin to ease through Wednesday and into Thursday and will be most frequent in the north and north west.
Mr Doran-Sherlock said that it is anticipated, from the current models, that the temperatures will turn warmer by the weekend with likely highs of six to 10 degrees Celsius “which is a significant rise on what we're getting at the moment. And the nights will be a little bit chilly, but nothing like what we're expecting at the moment. So by the weekend it will be a lot less cold.”
The yellow warning, issued by Met Éireann, will be in effect until noon on Tuesday but there is an expectation weather warnings will be upgraded to an orange level for some areas.
A yellow warning for low temperature for the entire country is in effect until 12am on Friday.
Tuesday will see frost and ice along with some lying snow will persist in some areas all day. Highest temperatures of just 0 to 5 degrees in light to moderate northwesterly winds, fresher at times near western and northern coasts.
Very cold nights with widespread frost, ice and lying snow can be expected until Friday.
Temperatures will struggle to get above freezing during the day. Tuesday night will see temperatures drop to as low as -8 degrees, with severe frost and icy stretches.
ESB Networks regional manager, Brian Tapley has spoken of the challenging conditions in their efforts to restore power to the 10,000 customers who remain without power during the current cold snap.
Mr Tapley said the counties that are worst affected are Kerry, Limerick and Tipperary with helicopters being used to transport repair crews to some areas where the difficulty is actually in identifying the location of faults and then repairing. He gave the example of Newcastlewest in Co. Limerick where the line feed to the village is damaged in a number of locations.
Crews are being brought in by helicopter each morning, he said. ESB Networks is working with the Department of Defence, local authorities and agricultural contractors to assess the situation.
Snow and ice storms cause different problems, he explained, which has led to situations where roofs have collapsed due to the weight of snow as have trees. In some cases ice has frozen the controls on transformers leading to short circuiting.
The chairperson of Kerry IFA, Jason Fleming has called on the government to have a “Plan B” when it comes to remote areas during extreme weather conditions.
Speaking on RTÉ radio’s Morning Ireland, Mr Fleming said his members were utilising farm vehicles that could travel roads in bad weather conditions to bring supplies to people stranded in remote areas without power.
The IFA is also assisting the HSE in getting medical supplies to remote areas and in transporting medical personnel to work. They are helping to “pull cars from ditches” and to remove trees and debris from the roads, he said.
