Ireland called in help from England and France as repair crews worked to restore power to hundreds of thousands of people after the most disruptive storm for years. Even as the cleanup continued, more wet and windy weather hit the UK, Ireland and France on Sunday.
More than 1 million people in Ireland, Northern Ireland and Scotland were left without electricity after Storm Eowyn (pronounced AY-oh-win) roared through on Friday.
In Ireland, which suffered the heaviest damage, the wind snapped telephone poles, ripped apart a Dublin ice rink and even toppled a giant wind turbine. A wind gust of 114 mph (183 kph) was recorded on the west coast, breaking a record set in 1945.
The state electricity company, ESB Networks, said that more than 300,000 properties in Ireland still had no power on Sunday, down from 768,000 on Friday. The Irish military was also helping out, but the company said that it could be two more weeks before electricity is restored to everyone.
Irish Minister for Social Protection Dara Calleary said authorities were “throwing everything at it.”
“We’re bringing additional people from England today and we’re looking for people from France, additional technicians,” he told broadcaster RTE. “What we’re focused on is getting our infrastructure back up, getting our power back up, getting our water and connectivity back up as soon as is possible.”
Another 75,000 people were still without power on Sunday in Northern Ireland, which is part of the United Kingdom and neighbors the Republic of Ireland.
At least two people died during the storm. Kacper Dudek, 20, was killed when a tree fell on his car in County Donegal in northwest Ireland, local police said.
Police in Scotland said that a 19-year-old man, who hasn’t been named, died in a hospital on Saturday after a tree fell on his car in the southwestern town of Mauchline on Friday.
More rainy and windy weather battered the UK and Ireland on Sunday, with a gust of 82 mph (132 kph) recorded at Predannack in southwest England. It was part of a new system named Storm Herminia by weather authorities in Spain, which was bracing for severe impact.
France’s weather service issued warnings for several regions, notably in Normandy and Brittany in the northwest. Canals and rivers broke their banks, roads were closed and evacuations were ordered in some areas.
The mayor of the Brittany city of Rennes said that it was experiencing its worst flooding in four decades. Local television showed families emptying out ground-floor rooms flooded by water a meter (three feet) high.
A 73-year-old British sailor was reported missing off the Atlantic coast near Bordeaux, France, according to the regional maritime authority. It said that he went boating alone Saturday despite storm warnings. His badly damaged boat was later found empty.
Associated Press
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