Flooding: ‘Lack of services’ – call for inquiry
30 Dec 1978AS WORKMEN and householders the damage to homes and property caused by severe flooding days, councillors representing the worst hit areas today slammed the lack of emergency services available. Snow fell heavily in Dublin today and the weathermen warned of icy weather and snow showers in some parts of the country over the weekend.
Today, representatives of the worst-hit area. Willington Estate in Templeogue, and Delvin Rd., Walkinstown, where over 70 families had to be evacuated, accused the local council of being ill-prepared to cope with the emergency.
A call for an investigation into the Council’s lack of emergency equipment, and their delay in getting relief to stricken areas came today from Fine Gael T.D., Mr. Larry McMahon. .
WERE WARNED
“The council were warned that there would be bad flooding as far back as last Saturday,” he said, “I told them about it myself but despite that, precautions were not taken to protect the homes from damage.
“I believe that many of these houses could have been saved if the pumping equipment and sandbags had been brought in more quickly”. Water flowed through most of the houses on the Willington Estate yesterday. And when the Civil-Defence were called in last night, they began pumping out the flood waters at a rate of 900 gallons a minute.
Mr. McMahon was joined in his criticism of emergency equipment and manpower by another local councillor, Mr. Joe Connolly, who represents the Tallaght and Walkinstown areas.
” INADEQUATE ”
“In view of the huge demand on manpower and equipment caused by the situation, it is quite clear that our services are totally inadequate,” he said. Cllr. Connolly has asked the County Manager to clarify how many emergency calls were received, and how the council workers coped with the situation. The representatives said that hundreds of pounds worth of damage had been caused to all the-houses in Willington Estate. And they claimed that householders would not be covered by insurance for storm damage. They called on either the local council or the government to set up an emergency fund.
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