A west Co Cork homeowner had a lucky escape on Sunday night when she managed to flee to safety after lightning struck her house.
However, the woman, aged in her 50s, has been left counting the cost after the strike caused a fire that badly damaged the two-storey property at Carhuvolour, Rossmore, which is about 12km from Clonakilty.
The woman is understood to have been home alone when the incident happened at around 8.40pm. She managed to get out of the building and raise the alarm but the blaze quickly engulfed the house.
Cork County Council said units from Cork County Fire Service based at Clonakilty, Dunmanway and Bandon responded and worked for several hours to bring the fire under control.
The house had been badly damaged, with the roof collapsing and only the four main walls left standing, before the blaze was extinguished and fire units left the scene at 3.10am.
The incident at Rossmore was one of several lightning strikes in west Cork on Sunday night, with others bringing down power lines which left several hundred homes without electricity overnight.
The Carlow Weather account on X posted a video of an electricity pole in Ballineen being struck by lightning and igniting.
The worst of the outages were around Clonakilty, Ballineen and Ahiohill and ESB Networks repair crews were out early to repair the damage and restore power to affected households.
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