The roads across Tipperary are in a very poor condition with up to 10 inches of snow in parts of the county overnight.
That’s the warning from Tipperary county council after a number of incidents of people having to be rescued when their cars got stuck as well as other minor crashes.
3,661 local homes and businesses are without power with the worst affected areas around Thurles, Upperchurch, Glengoole and Cashel.
ESB Networks says crews are starting to work on repairs where it is safe to do so but the expected restore time for all those faults is 6pm this evening and obviously dependent on other factors.
Almost 300 homes around Nenagh who were without power overnight do have the lights back on since this morning.
An orange level warning for snow and ice remains in place in Tipperary until 5pm this evening with another new orange alert affecting the county at that stage and lasting until 8pm.
There’s also a yellow warning locally until midnight and a yellow alert for the whole country will be in effect until midday on Thursday predicting continued icy conditions and low temperatures.
Senior Engineer with Tipperary County Council James Murray says a full salting and gritting programme is continuing but even treated roads aren’t safe to drive on.
”And we’ve had significant snowfall with reports of up to 10 inches in places. And that’s very difficult driving conditions obviously.
”We’ve had a number of minor road traffic incidents at this stage.
”Our salting program is in operation, the snow plows are on and the teams are mobilized
and the routes have been covered this morning already and that initial program will finish around 11.30am and then be mobilized again after that to make sure that we keep the salted network in as good a condition as possible.
”However, conditions are very poor even across that network. We would urge people not to rely on the fact they are on a salted route as any comfort as regards their driving behaviour and they need to adjust their driving to the conditions.”
