Will Electric Picnic be the wettest on record?… Odds don’t look great

The weather for Electric Picnic could be record-breaking – for all the wrong reasons, according to Ladbrokes.

The weather is not looking ideal for punters heading to Stradbally this weekend, with heavy rain forecast for most of the weekend as Ireland faces the remnants of Hurricane Erin.

Odds of this weekend being the wettest Electric Picnic on record are at 2/1.

Cal Gildart of Ladbrokes commented: ‘It’s not the news punters want to hear, but it looks EP will be a washout this year. Make sure to have rain jackets and wellies at the ready.’

The summer looks to be nearing its end officially, with Met Éireann predicting that the remnants of the hurricane took bring heavy rain and blustery winds this weekend.

The turn in weather has already begun with heavy scattered showers on Wednesday morning in various parts of the country.

Mark Bowe of Met Éireann explained that a change has taken place, with the days ahead ‘putting the final nail in our coffin for meteorological summer’ and ‘giving us an early taste of the autumn ahead’.

He said: ‘Well, as we head into the last week in August, which is the last week of the meteorological summer, it’s certainly going to feel like something has changed.

‘Those warm, sunny and humid days are, I’m afraid, gone now as we look ahead to more unsettled blustery weather and, of course, temperatures taking a dip as well, giving us an early taste of the autumn ahead.’

For the early birds at EP, Thursday brings ‘blustery westerly winds ushering a few showers, which could be heavy at times’. The temperature will also be dropping as the festival-goers are setting up for the weekend.

Friday looks a little better with a bit of sun in the morning but cloudy conditions for the rest of the day. There may be a few scattered showers in the late afternooon and early evening.

Saturday is where it looks to be the worst in Stradbally, with heavy rain expected in the morning and at around lunchtime this will only get worse.

The rain is expected to continue into the evening but will hopefully ease off at around 7pm.

It’s too early for a full forecast on Sunday and Monday but the early models indicate that there will be more rain in the afternoon on both days.

Despite the rain, it doesn’t look like it’ll be too cold at the festival but temperatures are still dropping.

Both Friday and Saturday look set to have highs of 18C and lows of 12C.