Village residents live in fear of another major flooding event

The flooding events of 2023 will not be forgotten by those residents who experienced the devastation when their homes were destroyed or badly damaged in the harrowing incidents.

In the first flood event in August 2023, emergency services helped some families evacuate their properties while others chose to remain in their homes but without electricity and await for waters to subside.

The scenes of devastation on the Village estate and Eastham Road led to calls for urgent flood prevention measures to be put in place while representations were made to the Taoiseach's office to request urgent compensation for victims of the flooding.

"It's the whole of the Village Estate which has something like 36 or 37 homes and only one or two of those have not been affected, the rest are completely flooded," said local Cllr Sharon Tolan at the time.

According to Cllr Tolan (pictured below at the Village estate flooding event in August 2023), the flooding threat started in the Northlands which historically has always been a problem area having being built on a flood plain.

"In 2005, against the advice of Meath County Council planners, councillors voted to make it residential and once zoning is given their hands are tied regarding granting planning permission.

"So when the problems started with Northlands the OPW got involved and a flood mitigation scheme was built which for the most part is very successful however we always have two pumps on hand because we are smack in the middle of so many different streams and in between two major rivers (the Nanny and the Boyne)."

Cllr Tolan said she believed the intense rainfall coupled with a very high tide, recorded at 4.95 metres meant there was no way to alleviate the pressure on the affected estates.

"Even though the council were pumping it out of the Northlands, the water had nowhere to go so the water levels rose in the Village Estate and the Eastham Caravan Park and we have over 30 homes completely destroyed."

While the community was still reeling from that incident a “traumatic” second major flooding event just two months later saw a number of housing estates in the area hit by intense rainfall with others having a lucky escape.

Two homes on the Golf Links Road and one in the Village estate in Bettystown bore the brunt of the impact with many more homes in nearby estates coming close to calamity.

Eighteen months on from that first incident residents are still waiting on the OPW to release the full findings of its report and recommendations on how to stop similar or worse events in the future. Meanwhile those home owners live in fear of another serious flood wreaking further havoc on their lives.