Met Éireann has issued rain warnings for counties Cork and Waterford for later today, with downpours potentially causing spot flooding and difficult travel conditions.
The status yellow warnings say “blustery spells of heavy rain” are to be expected, with the advisory for Cork running from 6pm to midnight and Waterford’s kicking in at 9pm and remaining in place until 3am on Saturday.
The hot and sunny weather of May seems like a distant memory with conditions forecast to stay damp and cool for the foreseeable future.
Friday will be a cool and showery day, with most of the showers concentrated in the south and west of the country, says Met Éireann. Rain will be widespread tonight.
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It will be a cloudy and wet start to Saturday for most and that pattern will remain throughout the day.
Sunday will bring more of the same, with heavy showers especially in the west of the country.
Temperatures will be between 12 and 17 degrees, which is cool for June, and the unsettled conditions are expected to last into next weekend.
Sunday will be the best day for Dublin, with a high of 18 degrees and morning showers, but otherwise it will be wet and miserable for the rest of the week in the capital, with rain more than likely on each day up to next Saturday.
Temperatures in Cork will be well below average, with most days only reaching a high of 15 degrees. Rain is forecast every day.
Climate scientists have posited a new theory as to why an area of the north Atlantic is cooling while the rest of the globe is warming.
This large area southeast of Greenland that stretches to the west of Ireland is known informally as the “warming hole” or the “cold blob”.
The latest evidence backs up the idea that it is caused by a weakening of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (Amoc), the system of currents that transports warmth from the tropics to Europe.
According to a report in the New Scientist, the Amoc carries warm, salty water from the Gulf of Mexico towards the north Atlantic, where it cools and sinks, flowing back south along the ocean floor.
Scientists believe Greenland’s melting ice is making this salty water less dense, so it sinks more slowly, weakening the circulation.
The Amoc could cross a tipping point within decades, which would lead to a frozen Europe and a disruption to monsoon rains, according to the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany.
They have investigated the “cold blob” based on direct weather observations from satellites, buoys and ships.
The scientists cautioned that they only have 22 years of observations in relation to Amoc.
