‘What a way to start the new year’: Cornish family left without a roof over their headspublished at 17:26 GMT 9 January
Sophie Woodcock and Jenny Kumah
BBC News
Thirty-year
old Tierren Brett, from Redruth, Cornwall, has described the
moment he realised the roof of his cottage had
blown away, whilst he was downstairs eating
dinner with his partner and four-year old son.
“The loft
hatch was flapping to start with…so I’ve come down and said, ‘like,
we’ve got a problem here, there’s a hole in the roof’,” says Brett.
“And
then before we know it, the whole roof was gone.”
He says a massive gust of wind – “like when you open a front door and a back
door” – managed to create “a huge wind tunnel”.
After taking his
son to safety, he returned to the property in Four
Lanes village to tackle the clear up which
continued into today.
“It was just all hands-on deck,” he says, describing how “loads of people” in the community, including family and friends, showed up instantly to lend a hand.
But the damage didn’t end there. Further down the street, loft insulation was left clinging to trees like Candi floss and slate tiles were scattered all over the road and surrounding properties.
Brett’s opposite neighbour, 42-year-old Lee Carne, had his car destroyed by bits of flying roof debris.
“I heard a bang and I thought it was all the wheelie bins coming through…but it was somebody’s roof hitting my front door and my car,” he says, adding that “there’s not much left of it”.
Brett says he feels lucky that no-one was hurt, and that they can stay with family until the damage is fixed.
“What a way to start the new year.”
