Marine Institute issues warning over high tides

The Irish Marine Institute has warned that Ireland will experience unusually high tides over the next few weeks.

It said any flooding problems that occur will be due to bad weather, or a storm surge, coinciding with the high tides between September 10th and October 9th.

Twice a year, at the Spring and Autumn equinoxes the biggest spring tides occur due to the alignment of the earth with the sun.

But tides also follow an 18.6 year 'nodal cycle' relating to the tilt of the moon and its orbit around the earth. This allows for an extremely big spring tide during this cycle.

With this in mind a Fianna Fáil senator has called on Dublin City Council to ensure all precautionary measures are taken to avoid floods, including clearing the drainage system.

"While there has been major investment in our flood defences in recent years, many drains are blocked and this will heighten the flood risk when some of the highest tides in two decades are expected in the city in less than two weeks," said Cyprian Brady.

"The Dublin Metropolitan Emergency Planning Group is keeping the situation under review, however, in the short space of time we have left it is important that the drainage system of the city is checked. Such an examination should take place before winter arrives whether there is a flood alert or not."

The senator said it was also important residents were kept fully informed of the risks of flooding ahead of the period of high tides.

Mr Brady said sandbags should be made available in the flood prone areas, especially along the Liffey River, the Dodder and Tolka, if there is bad weather forecast during the period.

"While the power of nature is impossible to control if we make the proper preparations now then we can reduce the risk to homes in the coming days," he said.

In Dublin on September 10th, a high tide level of 4.5 metres or 14.6 feet is predicted around 12.30am.

The Irish Marine Institute is working with a number of partners to install a permanent network of tide gauges with monitoring stations in Killybegs, Dublin Port, Rosslare, Castletownbere, Galway Harbour and the Kish Bank Lighthouse.

The information gathered can be used to increase the level of accuracy of tidal prediction and in conjunction with information from Met Éireann it can be used to predict storm surges that might cause flooding.