A gang of up to 30 youths vandalised a number of cars in Dublin city centre last night.

Some members of the group were armed with metal bars.

Video footage below sent into Independent.ie shows the wing mirror of one car flying into the air after one of the youths struck it with an object.

The shocking incident happened at around 9pm on Railway Street, in Dublin's north inner city.

Council staff were cleaning up broken glass in the area this morning and gardai said they are now investigating three incidents of criminal damage. No arrests have been made.

One person working nearby described what happened.

"Around 9pm two big groups of teenagers started throwing metal objects and glass and they started to become very aggressive, shouting and screaming. They then started destroying cars in the street.

"This happened two days ago too. I'm very concerned and hope that the gardai can do something about it."

An eye witness said he saw two gangs around the same area on Sunday night also.

He said the youths were armed with bars and some even had knuckle dusters.

"They were around the Talbot Street area and one fella shouted at his friend to pass him his knuckle duster. They scattered towards the Abbey Street area when gardai arrived in the area."

Local councillor Nial Ring said this kind of vandalism is happening on a "regular basis" and he is liaising with gardai to address the issue.

"It’s a nightmare. We tend to see this kind of behaviour coming up to Halloween and we are hoping more gardai will be deployed in the area.

"The increased garda patrol in that area over the past few months has had a significant impact. The problem is the people doing this vandalism are getting more brazen and they are getting younger.

"There are a lot of youth clubs in the area who have done huge work to get kids off the street but this little cohort is causing a lot of problems. There's around 20 to 30 of them."

Vandalism incidents involving cars have also been happening on the south side of Dublin recently.

Independent.ie previously reported how 12 cars have been burned out in the Portobello area over the past two months.

Expand Close This car was burnt out in the area in July / Facebook

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Whatsapp This car was burnt out in the area in July

Jim O'Callaghan TD has condemned the acts and believes the burnings are a ploy to occupy gardai while other criminal activities are happening in the area.

"This is an issue that has been going on for nearly 2 months now," he told Independent.ie.

"I met the superintendent in Kevin Street recently to talk about the issue.

"The gardaí are aware of who is behind it and the reasons. It appears that these burnings are being carried out to distract the gardaí from doing other important work there in the area. I have asked for increased garda presence."

Online Editors