Damage to electricity network after lightning strikes

Scottish Hydro Electric reported severe damage to their network after the lightning strikes seen in the county on Tuesday night.

Orkney manager for Scottish Hydro Electric, Stevie Burns, said that through the night 15 different incidents were caused by the lightning, with power lines and utility poles catching fire, transformers damaged and fuses blown.

With the first report of power outages coming from Birsay at around 10.20pm on Tuesday, Scottish Hydro Electric have said that over 2,500 properties were affected. The area between Quoyloo and Finstown saw the worst of the problems, although there were also outages in the North Isles and the East Mainland.