More floods like Donegal to come – eco priest

Ireland can expect to see more flooding on the devastating scale experienced in Donegal last week as a result of the effects of climate change, according to a well-known ecologist.

Fr Sean McDonagh SSC told The Irish Catholic that while the flooding in Donegal, which has displaced 47 families following severe rainfall, can’t be said to be directly caused by climate change, “it is a dimension as the situation gets worse and we can expect more and more of this”.

“One of the interesting reasons it was so devastating was that it was also a high tide,” he said. “The climate probably has more to do with the level of the ocean than we thought 10 years ago. We thought the ocean might rise by one metre in this century, now a lot of people say it could be double or treble that. These are the kind of issues that created a perfect storm in the North of Ireland.”

Generations

Fr McDonagh said in Ireland “we have done very little to address this in any comprehensive way over the last 25 years”. He said we haven’t taken climate change seriously and “future generations are going to be paying for what we do now”.