Revealed: The five beaches out of use to swimmers this summer due to pollution fears

What was described as a “challenging” season has had the knock-on ­effect of putting five beaches out of use this summer.

They include three in Co Dublin – Sandymount in the city, and Loughshinny and Balbriggan Front Strand in the north of the county.

Balbriggan was also out of bounds last year and two other beaches are also restricted for another year: Lady’s Bay in Buncrana, Co Donegal; and Trá na mBan in An Spidéal, Co Galway.

Record rainfall in July and a slew of storms in August were the main ­problem, bringing heavy rain that overloaded drains and sewage pipes and washed dirty water into the sea.

However, run-off from farmers’ fields, fouling by dogs, algal blooms and faulty sewage connections also played their part. It meant that even when the rain stopped long enough for people to get out and about, some beaches remained off limits to swimmers for days.

In total there were 45 closure orders – up 25pc on 2022 – because pollution was detected or because of algal blooms on the water but an additional 228 ­“prior warning” notices were also issued – 20pc more than in 2022.

These are issued when heavy rain is forecast and beaches with a history of overflow problems will potentially be polluted.

Swimmers can take their chances on beaches under notice but the advice is to avoid the water until the flow has settled down to normal levels – at least for 48 hours.

The findings are in the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) annual bathing water quality report, which compiles the results of local authority testing at 148 beaches around the country.

Overall water quality is good ,according to the tests, with 114 beaches ranked as excellent, 24 as good, five as sufficient and five as poor.

Testing is mandatory only from June 1 to September 15, however, so the EPA warns that people who swim outside of the formal season may not have full water quality information. It says they should observe the 48-hour no-swim advice after heavy rain even if no prior warning is issued.

There are also many beaches that do not have official bathing water designation so testing can be sporadic.

The Beaches.ie website provides some information on those during the summer months.

The EPA said the challenging summer highlighted the need to build “climate resilience” into public bathing waters.

It said local authorities should provide green areas in towns for sustainable urban drainage systems that act as soakage for heavy rain so that it would not overwhelm street drains.

Uisce Éireann needed to move faster with planned upgrades to wastewater collection and treatment facilities, it added. Greater effort was also needed in farming areas to stop pollutants running off into waterways.

“While beach closures play an important role in protecting bathers’ health, local authorities need to improve their understanding of the pressures which can impact beaches in the context of changing rainfall patterns,” Dr Eimear Cotter of the EPA said.