Fright of her life: Longford grandmother (88) has lucky escape as Storm Éowyn sends tree crashing into her home

As Storm Éowyn ravaged the country from Thursday night until the early hours of Friday morning one woman got the fright of her life when a massive spruce tree crashed into her home.

Marie Flynn (88) has been living in the Granard property for most of her life and recently got her kitchen renovated.

She had just made a cup of tea after being woken by the sound of the wind beating against the house and returned to her room when the tree crashed through the roof of the kitchen.

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Her daughter Dolores Flynn who was there the night of the storm spoke to the 'Longford Leader' about the terrifying ordeal.

“It was so loud, it was the loudest noise, it was like a train hitting your house,” she recalled.

“We jumped up and just saw the tree coming through the room so we didn't go out because the wind was howling then.

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“For the next three hours, we just sat inside waiting for the wind to go so we could see what the damage was.

“It was very scary.”

The tree ripped through the roof of the kitchen and pierced the thatched roof into the bedrooms upstairs, thankfully no one was in them. The bathroom door was speared as well and a powerline was ripped apart.

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“We were devastated, it was just because it’s only been recently renovated and had a whole new kitchen put into it in the last few months.

“It was so upsetting.”

Mrs Flynn herself was completely shocked by the event.

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“She got such a fright, she had just made tea in the kitchen and she was just so shocked because we never thought the tree would fall like that or fall on the house,” recalls Dolores.

“We never thought that that would happen to us, and the noise, I think we’re all traumatised by it.”

Luckily three of Marie’s sons were available to help move the tree as unfortunately due to the storm no services were available.

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“I have such great brothers and my son, they have the roof propped up and they’ve removed the tree off the house to get the weight off the house.”

The four men have been working day and night to get as much of the tree away from the house as possible.

“There is still some of the tree in the thatch because we’re afraid of damaging it more by taking it out,” explained Dolores.

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“We’ll have to wait and get a thatcher to come and have a look to see what the damage is.

“We don’t know what damage has been done to the rafters inside the house but it still needs a new roof, new walls in the kitchen, and a lot of repairs to the thatch.

“There's no insurance on it because it’s a thatched house so look we’ll pull together and try to get it restored, we are out of date for a thatching grant, but hopefully we’ll apply and maybe get some funding in relation to the thatch.

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“The house is a couple of hundred years old and we wouldn’t like to have to change it at this stage we’d like to get it re-thatched, get it repaired and see what funding or what help will be available for us.

“Today I’m hopefully going to talk to some of the local coounty councillors of who may be able to give us some directions as to where to go from here.”