Irish village without water during hottest week of year

Residents of a village in the Republic of Ireland were left without water for several days during the hottest week of the year.

The outage in Ballivor, County Meath, came as the island of Ireland recorded its hottest May day on record earlier this week.

Independent councillor Noel French said water has since been restored after being tankered in from nearby towns and added that residents deserve a decent water supply.

Irish water provider Uisce Éireann said that upgrade works are planned, which will include a water storage upgrade at Ballivor in June.

Aontú councillor Dave Boyne said parts of Ballivor had been without water since Sunday and that the local school was forced to close as a result.

He told BBC News NI that water outages have been a long running issue in the area.

"The water has been off since Sunday, it might be back on in parts today, but it's just been mayhem for people," he said.

"People can't flush the toilet, take a shower, it's like living in a third world country."

Boyne added that party colleagues had been going door to door to deliver bottled water to those who may have difficulties leaving their house.

Social Democrats councillor Ronan Moore said the outages reflect continuing challenges across the county where "creaking infrastructure is unable to cope with heightened demand and the changing climate".

Local resident Gareth Ferguson said everybody in Ballivor uses bottled water as the tap water is not safe to drink.

He moved to the village in 2019 and said there were occasional water outages then - typically about once a week.

By 2021 he said the outages had got so bad that water tankers were brought in to provide water from nearby towns. The practice has continued into 2026.

"The longest without water was in 2021, that was six days. This recent one was four days," he said.

People from the village staged a protest back in 2021 and again on Thursday.

Ferguson, a HGV driver, added that the recent hot weather had made the issues harder to ignore.

"It's a lot worse, hygiene pretty much goes out the window," he said.

"Some residents are in a way lucky if they have family they can go to in other towns to wash their clothes and get showers. Some have to pay to go use swimming pool or gym showers.

"I come in from a long day's work sweaty and dirty not knowing whether I'm going to be able to get a shower."

An Uisce Éireann spokesperson said the works on the water storage upgrade will commence on 8 June with the main upgrade work due to begin about 22 June.

"Water mains improvement works are also being planned and, once Uisce Éireann obtains the required licence for these works to proceed, we will advise customers of the timeline," they said.