South-westerly gales caused severe power cuts in parts of the west yesterday. The extreme weather conditions also hampered the airlift of an injured fisherman off the Cork coast.
Some 10,000 homes were without power yesterday morning, according to the ESB, with 5,000 of those along the western seaboard.
Although supplies were expected to be restored last night, the ESB predicted continuing gales and lightning could disrupt supplies again.
The lightning storm was first detected at 4 p.m. on Sunday.
The ESB's monitoring equipment identified two bands.
One which struck Galway on Sunday night and yesterday, and worked its way over to south Dublin.
A second moved on a north-easterly track from Kerry to Carlow and Kilkenny.
The storms knocked out electricity supplies in the greater Galway area, in Limerick, Mayo, Kerry, Clonmel, Co Tipperary, and Fermoy, Co Cork.
While supplies were restored within several hours in most of the affected areas, damage to an underground cable in Dangan, Galway city, resulted in power cuts for much of the day in the IDA industrial estate and six housing estates.
Restoration of supply in Tuam and Ballygar was also delayed.
Other parts of the country were not spared.
Thousands of homes in an area stretching from west Limerick through much of Kerry and into west Cork were without electricity.
Many hundreds of homes also lost their telephone service.
At Tullah, some four miles from Kenmare a two-storey house was badly damaged.
Fire officers believe the house was struck by lightning.
Two units of the fire service fought the blaze shortly after 1 p.m. The roof and upstairs area of the house were damaged.
At the peak of the damage, more than 3,000 homes were without electricity in Kerry.
Power had been restored to most homes by last night, though crews were working to restore power to about 500 homes late yesterday afternoon.
There was flooding on the main Killarney to Tralee road, with units of the fire service called to deal with this and other incidents on roads, after heavy rain and hail showers.
The high winds and seas forced the Shannon-based Coast Guard medium-lift helicopter to abandon two attempts to winch an injured crewman off a Spanish vessel some 40 miles south-west of Baltimore, Co Cork, early yesterday morning.
The crewman, one of 15 on board the 40-metre stern trawler, Nueva Confurco, was reported to have been knocked unconscious when struck by a steel warp.
An emergency call was put through shortly after midnight. The helicopter battled south-westerly gusts of force eight to nine to reach the vessel, and was on scene at 2.45 a.m.
However, the extremely difficult and dangerous conditions, including a 20-foot swell, hampered attempts to lift the man off, and the helicopter returned to Cork to refuel.
It then made a second attempt at about 6 a.m., as the vessel headed for the coast.
The Coast Guard instructed the vessel to try to reach Castletownbere.
It alerted the Castletownbere lifeboat.
The vessel was entering the channel to the fishing port in Bantry Bay when the helicopter airlifted the injured man off at 9 a.m. and took him to Cork University Hospital.
