Major clean up underway as damage from Storm Chandra will take "months" to repair

A major clean up operation has begun on Wednesday morning following the destruction left by Storm Chandra on Tuesday.

Counties across Ireland, including the worst hit Wexford, Dublin and Wicklow, have begun repairing damage that was caused on Tuesday but local councillors say it will take "months to repair".

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Speaking on RTÉ's Morning Ireland, Labour Party councillor in Dublin Lettie McCarthy spoke of how harrowing it was to speak to stressed families whose homes have been destroyed by floods.

She said that damage in areas like Kilternan and Stepaside will take "months to repair" and that a lot of families will struggle to find a place to rent if they can't access their homes.

Cllr McCarthy said she hopes this is a "wake-up call" and that everything has a knock-on effect but "you wouldn't expect that with new houses".

Also speaking was head of Climate Services with Me Éireann Keith Lambkin who said the yellow warnings yesterday were based on expected rainfall levels but the rain the Storm Chandra brought across Ireland was concentrated on the east and south east.

Mr Lambkin said that because of knock-on consequences to the jet stream from very cold conditions in the US at the moment, "that caused those fronts and those systems that the west coast would normally get, they were all coming up and exposing the south east.

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"So, the south east was getting all of that rainfall that the west would normally get, and that really led to complicated problems. That system itself then, based on the amount of rain that was expected and the known fact that it was saturated levels, the local authorities and so forth would have been warned of the likes of localised flooding and many acted on the basis of that."

Mr Lambkin went on to say that there are flood warnings being put in place and Met Éireann's rain warnings are separate from that.

"What other jurisdictions have is a more complicated, better observation system that then feeds higher resolution models that then feeds into a warning system. Ireland is currently in the process of putting that system in place, but only components of that are in there at the moment. That's still in development," he added.

Speaking on the Tonight Show on Virgin Media, Carlow Weatherman Alan O'Reilly has said that he has been saying for "many years" that Ireland needs a flood warning system and that although Met Éireann has a flood forecasting team, the forecasts are not made public.

"The yellow rain warning that was issued for parts, including Wicklow and Wexford, there was no yellow rainfall warning for Dublin only wind. That is completely useless when it comes to flood forecasting as it doesn't take into account how high the river levels are or how much rainfall has fallen in the 2 weeks before that. 

"So we need that flood forecasting system made public, we need to see it up and running, but we need data from the likes of the Wicklow mountains in real time being fed into the weather models so we can get an estimation of how quick and how high these river levels are going to rise.

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"They have a great flood warning system in the UK, that is very localised it goes river by river. We seem to be 10 years on from the announcement in the Dáil, but we're not getting the information to the public."

️ “We need that flood warning system made public, we need to see it up and running,” — @saloreilly#TonightVMTV #StormChandra pic.twitter.com/sRS2VKVXSI

— TonightVMTV (@TonightVMTV) January 27, 2026

Of the days to come, Mr O'Reilly has said there is still "uncertainty on weather models for low system on Friday. Most models were keeping it south of Ireland but latest high resolution HARMONIE model brings it into Southeast Ireland with risk of more heavy rainfall. This needs careful watching over next 48 hours."