Skip to content

Snow and ice hit Northern Ireland

John Sheppard Culicagh mountainJohn Sheppard
Snowfall on Culicagh mountain, Country Fermanagh

Snow and ice has been recorded in Northern Ireland on Thursday after overnight temperatures fell to freezing in most areas.

A yellow weather warning was put in place, with snow falling overnight.

The Met Office warning was in place from 00:00 GMT until 09:00 on Thursday, with a similar warning issued in the Republic of Ireland.

It is predicted there could be disruption to travel, and injuries from slips and falls.

Met Éireann has also issued yellow level warnings for snow and ice across the Republic of Ireland.

Ambulance NI NI snowfallAmbulance NI
Temperatures reached freezing across Northern Ireland on Thursday

Ahead of the wintry weather overnight into Thursday, clouds edged in from the Atlantic.

A band of rain, sleet and snow pushed southeast across Northern Ireland, and is expected to clear during Thursday.

Away from some northern and eastern coasts, this will fall mainly as snow with accumulations of 1-2cm (0.4in - 0.8in) possible.

Two to 5cm of snow is possible on hills above about 150m (492ft).

Accumulating snow may well affect the Glenshane Pass and other high level roads. Snow should ease, and may turn back to rain, before clearing.

Widespread ice

Regardless of snow accumulations, after several cold days, ice is likely to be relatively widespread on untreated surfaces.

James Armagh snowJames
Weather watcher James captured the snow fall in Armagh

On Thursday morning, many will awaken to a covering of snow and it is still likely to be snowing for a time in Belfast along with much of County Down and County Armagh.

The area of sleet and snow will continue to move south and should clear all of Northern Ireland before midday.

Allow Twitter content?

This article contains content provided by Twitter. We ask for your permission before anything is loaded, as they may be using cookies and other technologies. You may want to read  and  before accepting. To view this content choose ‘accept and continue’.
1px transparent line

Thursday afternoon

Skies will brighten for Thursday afternoon with some sunshine and scattered showers. It will be another very cold day.

There could be some further snow on Thursday night but it will be of a patchy nature and not as widespread as the wintry weather on Wednesday night.

Steel City Watcher RandalstownSteel City Watcher
Steel City Watcher captured the snowfall in Randalstown, County Antrim

Ice and frost however will be widespread again by Friday morning.

The outlook for the weekend is for a lot of dry weather but also a gradual trend to cloudier skies and less frosty weather by Sunday.

Early next week it will be noticeably milder but also more unsettled.