The thawing ice after Ireland’s cold snap could see water mains burst over the next few days, Uisce Eireann have said.

After a significant amount of snow and ice over the last week, the rising temperatures over the next few days could provide some difficulty with water pipes, mains and flooding.

On Newstalk Breakfast, Uisce Eireann Regional Operations Manager Stephen Burke said with the temperature swing that we’re about to see, it is likely to result in “a very large increase in burst water mains” across the country.

"Hot spots"

“The snow and the power outages earlier in the week caused a lot of water treatment problems for us, which had a big impact in the southern part of the country - North Cork, North Kerry, Limerick [and] Tipperary,” he said.

“But the temperature swing that we're about to see here, going from -6C to 10C, is likely to result in a very large increase in burst water mains across the country.

“We have a number of hot spots where we would be particularly exposed to situations like this - East Limerick, Croom, Oola, the Cooley Peninsula in Louth, North Kildare, North Wicklow and most of Dublin.”

Be "conscientious" of water usage

Mr Burke said Uisce Eireann are asking everyone to be “conscientious” of the water that they are using.

“There are a number of things people can do to conserve water, like take shorter showers, make sure their dishwashers are full when they're turning them on, don't leave taps running, fix dripping taps and the most critical thing people can do is if they find leaks in their home, get them fixed as quickly as they can,” he said.

“We can support this with our first fix free scheme.

“Also [on] roads [or] footpaths, as you're driving or walking around, if you see water rising on the footpaths or on the roads, please report it into us.”

Don't leave taps running

While a lot of people might have been under the impression that leaving taps running slightly helps water to move through the taps, Mr Burke said that as temperatures rise, they would ask people not to do this.

“Now, as the temperatures are rising, we would advise everyone to stop doing that - if everybody leaves taps running, the water will run out very quickly,” he said.

Care teams from Uisce Eireann are available to help anyone having issues with water 24/7, Mr Burke advised.

Uisce Eireann can be found on all social media channels or through water.ie.

Photo shows workers applying a patch to the pipe. 1/8/2017 Photo: Eamonn Farrell/RollingNews.ie