Tony Hassall’s partner, Gerry Coyle, had just left their conservatory when the tree came crashing down.
“We were having new flooring put in downstairs, so we were moving stuff in and out,” Mr Hassall said. “Fifteen seconds later, the whole tree came down.
“I thought he’d dropped something, and I went in, and he was in shock looking at it. It’s the sort of thing you can’t believe has happened.”
The conservatory, at the back of the couple’s home in Prehen in Derry, was completely destroyed when the tree fell on top of it during Storm Éowyn on Friday.
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The “huge tree – I would say it’s at least 25-30m tall” was part of the ancient Prehen Wood. On Monday it remained “sitting on the roof at an angle down the back”, Mr Hassall said.
“The conservatory’s just completely written off, we had a decking area to the back which has all come down.
“We can’t get out the back door because the tree’s blocking the whole back of the house.
[ Storm Éowyn: Crews brought from EU countries to help ESB restore powerOpens in new window ]
“All those things can be fixed so we’re very fortunate that there’s been no injuries, and I know somebody’s lost their life, which is incredibly sad, so we’re lucky. It’s just structure and it’s repairable.
“It’s sad, because some of the stuff – we’ve lived in Australia, in the Philippines, in New Zealand – some of the sentimental stuff we’ve collected, we’re saddest we’ve lost some of that stuff, but we’ve got our health.”
Approximately 56,000 households in the North remained without electricity as of 4.30pm on Monday afternoon, according to Northern Ireland Electricity (NIE) Networks.
Power has been restored to 229,000 properties following the extensive damage to the electricity network caused by Storm Éowyn.
It hopes to have most customers reconnected by Thursday morning but expects some will not have their power restored until February 3rd.
About 60 schools in Northern Ireland were closed on Monday due to lack of power or structural damage following the storm, and 25 schools have indicated they will not or may not open on Tuesday.
The managing director of NIE Network, Derek Hynes, said “restoration efforts are well under way and we are using every resource available to us to try to restore power to households and businesses as quickly as we possibly can.
“Additional engineers are already working on the network, with more arriving over the course of the week,” he said. “We have also secured additional helicopters to speed up our assessment process and additional generators to support the most vulnerable in the community.”
Visiting the company’s Belfast headquarters on Monday, northern secretary Hilary Benn said “we have got a way to go yet” but the UK government had been “working very hard… to meet the requests for support from the Northern Ireland Executive.
Speaking to reporters on Monday, First Minister Michelle O’Neill and deputy first minister Emma Little-Pengelly said they had asked NIE Networks to consider goodwill payments for people who remained without electricity.
“Those people who are without electricity and water are suffering real hardship,” Ms Little-Pengelly said. “I think it is the right thing to do for NIE to step up and do a goodwill payment.”
Mr Hynes said “We are engaged with the ministers on this matter, but our primary focus right now is to continue our work to restore power to all affected customers across Northern Ireland.”
[ Storm relief hubs hailed for swift response to Storm Éowyn crisis and aftermathOpens in new window ]
Meanwhile, the funeral of Kacper Dudek, the 20-year-old from Lifford, Co Donegal, who died when a tree fell on his car during Storm Éowyn, will take place on Thursday.
Parish priest Fr Michael McCaughey told the BBC Mr Dudek had “called his father to say he had met a tree down on the road, and subsequent to that, the father told him to turn back and take a different road home.
“Within yards, I would say, a tree had fallen on his car, and it’s a terrible tragedy for the family. When you hear a father say, I spoke to my son, told him to take a different direction home, and he never came home.”
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