Bread Alert!

‘We never saw the likes of it before’ say retailers in Tralee

THERE were astonishing scenes across the county prior to the arrival of Storm Emma last week as people queued for bread and essential supplies, creating images more reminiscent of the former Soviet Union than Kerry.

The sight of people waiting in line for bread outside one Tralee supermarket on Thursday morning produced scenes never before witnessed by staff as Met Éireann’s Status Red alert asked people to remain indoors from 4pm.

“I never saw the likes of it before,” said Sandra Lynch of Garvey’s Super Valu in Rock Street.

“People were waiting for bread deliveries to come which normally would have been here early in the morning but were obviously late due to the poor state of the roads. We’ve certainly never seen anything like it before in the shop,” she added.

Nolan’s Garage in North Circular Road, Tralee ran out of kerosene as supply trucks couldn’t reach Kerry once the storm intensified.

But proprietor Niall Nolan believes the media had a lot to do with ‘hyping the storm up’.

“We got away with the worst of the weather here and the media certainly caused panic in some people which led to them rushing out to buy food like they did; it was crazy stuff,” Niall said.

“We were closed for two days because of the storm and the whole thing was a strange experience to say the least,” he added.

Stores like Lidl, Aldi, Dunnes and Tesco also saw a huge surge in bread sales with shelves emptying in minutes after being stacked. Sales in milk and alcohol also rose sharply as people braced themselves for the lock-down. There were even reports in one Tralee store of people fighting over the last of the bread supplies.

From 2pm on Thursday streets and byways across the county were deserted as people made their way home early in anticipation of the beast from the east.

Bernie Hayes stocking up on the sliced pans in a busy pre-Emma bread rush at Garvey’s SuperValu in Tralee on Thursday morning (above) with a little help from Garvey’s employee Tommy Hurley, left, and John Ryall of Irish Pride, right.

There were just a few loaves left on the shelves of Tralee’s shops by mid-day on Thursday.

Killian and Hugh Crean helping out on the family bread run in Garvey’s in Tralee.

The sign on Eason’s in The Mall, Tralee, alerting customers to closing hours