Terrifying ship's video shows storm-force seas off Irish coast
The series of Atlantic storms that have battered the country since last month seem at this stage to have rolled into one another, but if you'll cast your mind back to February 1 you'll recall that Storm Brigid was one of the weather events that wrought havoc on the south and west coasts.
We reported at the time how Brigid caused extensive flooding in Limerick, Clare and Galway and cut power to thousands of people countrywide.
But surveying the destruction on land it's easy to forget that even as the storm was blowing its hardest some hardy souls had no choice but to be out in the thick of it - and the men and women aboard vessels plying the Atlantic had some pretty lumpy seas to contend with.
This video, shot off the southern Irish coast on February 1 and posted to YouTube yesterday, shows exactly what it was like to be on the high seas (literally) in the teeth of Storm Brigid.
As Corkman Steve Golden - who posted the video to Reddit - explains, the waves to be seen in the clip are around 15-17 metres in height.
The biggest ones kick in from about the 3:50 mark with a particular monster just after 4:30, for the impatient ones among you.
Rather him, than us, is all we're saying.
The video has caught fire online, racking up almost 400,000 YouTube views in 24 hours and making it to the front page of Reddit.
The unnamed ship from which the video was shot is 62 metres long and weighs 1,500 tonnes, according to Golden - and yet it's being tossed around like a rubber duck in a bathtub in winds that reached over 85 knots (around 100mph).
"It can be dangerous, but you do a lot to mitigate the danger," Steve commented.
"Quite literally batten down the hatches. All doors shut, external and internal. Every thing stowed. Doing the rounds regularly to check everything.
"I suppose like most things, its as dangerous as you make it, but with added possibility of drowning."
To show something of a height comparison, here's the front of the GPO in Dublin's O'Connell St, which measures 15.2m from ground to cornice.
Remember, the highest of the waves in the clip are up to 17m.
"I wouldn't advise anyone to do this job," he added.
"It's a choice you make yourself.
"There is a small box at the bottom of the application form saying 'Are you slightly mental?' and if you nay tick it you don;'t get the job."
