Barking dog saves owner

Galway survived fairly unscathed from the storms that raged through the West over the Christmas period – with gusts up to 135kph in the city.

However, one city man could well have been a fatal statistic when his apartment was stuck by lightning in the early hours of Sunday morning.

Paul Carr of The Spinnaker in Old Knocknacarra believes if he hadn’t been woken by his dog, he would have slept through and not lived to tell the tale.

Mr Carr sleeps on the premises, in an apartment in an annex of the hotel, and last Sunday night was in his bed when lightning struck the roof at around 4.30am.

His dog, Ruben, a Springer Spaniel started barking immediately and Mr Carr woke and got up to bring him outside thinking he needed to answer a call of nature.

“I honestly didn’t know what had happened. I had slept through the winds and when Ruben woke me up, I just thought he needed to go outside. Thankfully, he did wake me up because when I went outside, I realised the whole place was ablaze.

“I called 999 immediately and five fire brigades arrived to put out the blaze. Most of the roof of the annex to the rear of the Spinnaker pub was severely damaged. Even the pub was smoke damaged but a few regulars came later that day to help me clean up and we were able to open.

“Both the Garda and fire investigators said the blaze started when lightning hit the roof. I consider myself a lucky man. If I hadn’t a dog, I would have slept through it,” he says.

 Another family in Knocknacarra woke up to find a trampoline and part of their neighbour’s shed in their back garden yesterday morning.

Malachy Duggan, also a publican (the Blue Note) had slept through the winds and hadn’t realised that a whole trampoline as well as two sides of a wooden shed had been hurled over his garden wall.

Gusts of 135kph were recorded (nearly 84 miles per hour) at Galway Docks at 12.35am yesterday morning.

For more on this story, see the Galway City Tribune.