On Saturday, March 14th the LMFAO061 inbox received a distressing message from a local business owner in dire need of our help. Exasperated by the lack of help from the city council, they turned to us. Our investigators have spent time logging the report and investigating potential avenues. Here is the email we received at 4:43pm:

I just wanted to send in a report about some disruptions that Limerick businesses have experienced today.

At 9:30 am i noticed a load of emptied out rubbish next to a large general waste bin (picture a.) i thought maybe there was an accident when someone was putting the bags of rubbish into the wheelie bin.

Picture a.

At approx 12:45pm i noticed that the bins at my establishment had been ravaged in the same way (picture b.) despite our bins being locked up behind metal fences.

Picture b.

Whoever did this only targeted general waste and compost bins. This and the fact they could surpass 7ft metal fences leads myself and other local business owners to suspect it must be a giant rat (possibly mutant).

The problem must be addressed ASAP we have contacted the Limerick City Council but as per usual our queries are ignored. The council will not protect local businesses from the rat.

Please LMFAO061, can you help us?

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We will answer your call, Limernaut. First, let us explore the feasibility of a giant rat cryptid operating within Limerick city. We contacted a local plumber and sewer enthusiast, Dermot Curtain of ‘Curtain & Sons’, and quizzed him on his experiences with supernaturally rotund rodents.

“Ya Rats in Limerick as big as cats, myself and youngest son Cú Chulainn, were unblocking a toilet there in Supermacs O'Connell street, and I'd say a rat as big as a cat came up out the bowl. It went loola round the bathroom, left the place covered in brown little skidmarks. Eventually, sure Cú Chulainn got his hands on the thing, and didn’t he squeeze it so hard that one of its eyes came out a bit. Thing was sitting there, one pupil bigger than the other, not moving a muscle. Eventually, sure rang WWF, PETA and the ISPCA, but none of them wanted it, so we put it back in and said nothing.”

Curtain was visibly shaken after relaying the story to LMFAO investigators. He put us in touch with an electrician who repairs cables in the main sewer lines of Limerick City.

“Under O’Connell Street, there are huge tunnels used for ferrying sewrage to and from Dublin City”, Perry ‘The Nail’ O’Donoghue explained when we sat down to discuss the rat situation.

“I never go down there without an axe because there are rats as big as cats down there.”

“I'd say that they go above ground when it gets too hot, all the gas from the faeces, poo and things builds up and makes these big dense pockets of green gas. Sometimes I have to come back up cause there’s a cloud of it rolling towards me.”

“Limerick rats are gentle things who have their fill eating poo, but there are these big posh Dublin rats walking down the mains to Limerick and eating their fill of our poo and things. And then there's nothing left for any of them, so they go into their cocoons for the winter and come up topside in summer as big as cats to eat out of the wheelie bins.”

“You won't find this in the papers now. I heard this from my cousin, who knows Simon Harris, but it was a massive problem in Dublin a few years ago. Full babies, toddlers, men and Dunne's wheelie bins were disappearing all over the city. Dáil started locking its bins cause it caught rats as big as cats on the CCTV. They knew it would cause a situation down south with the less civilised people. They started the whole Return bottles scheme and said people would be digging through the bins, but really it was cause the rats would be coming up.”

“I fear what'll happen to the world if those rats get bigger than cats.”

Perry was nearly in tears by the end of our interview.

Limerick is not the only place experiencing attacks from rats as big as cats. Cities all over the world – such as Birmingham and Nenagh have reported sightings.

We have contacted several other local plumbers and even the Limerick City Council, but all declined to comment.

It seems that the official method of deterrence is to lock your bins – a measure that did not protect the business that contacted us. We took the initiative to protect Limerick's babies and men by sealing all manhole covers and public toilets with cement.

Our advice to those who come across one of these rats - Run.

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If you have any information or personal encounters with giant limerick rats, please send an email to Limericksaucer123@gmail.com