Beast from the East blows for Ballycastle

Although the north coast escaped the worst of the snowy and icy conditions last week, it was the easterly winds that did the damage.

Work began by Causeway Coast and Glens Council on clearing the sand which blew onto the town’s promenade on Monday.

But the work on restoring the club’s bowling green will be down to the members.

“It’s not the first time that this has happened, but there’s never been as much sand as this before,” said the club’s secretary Sammy Craig.

“It happens when the wind turns and blows in from the east.

“There’s nothing for it but to have the members out with shovels and we will hire a motorised wheelbarrow to take the sand back to the beach and tip it over the promenade wall.

“It’s just going to be a lot of hard manual labour.”

The sand itself won’t cause much damage to the surface, although the soil could be damaged by the salt that comes with it.

An assessment of that will be carried out once all the sand has been removed.

“Hopefully, it will be okay,” added Sammy.

“We are still a good bit away from the start of the season, so at least we do have a little time on our hands to sort it out.”