Power has been restored to homes in Suffolk after overnight thunderstorms hit the county damaging cables.

Ferocious storms, which saw approximately 25,000 lightning strikes across the south east, battered Suffolk overnight.

Two houses were hit by lightning during the early hours of the morning, with one incident in Shotley causing a fire which severely damaged a bungalow.

Following the storms, several areas were left without power in Suffolk, including one house that had suffered a direct hit.

A spokesman from UK Power Networks said that it is now "business as usual" after the repairs were made.

In Tuddenham St Martin, there was a power outage at around 1.30am today after a house was struck by lightning.

Harry Gamble was going to bed when he heard a huge bang and a flash of light in his property in Main road in the village.

The strike hit the aerial on his house, before passing through the roof into pipes in the attic.

It then travelled through the house in metal water pipes, bursting the hot water mains and flooding part of the property.

"There was a huge bang and then water just seemed to come from everywhere," Mr Gamble said.

"I went into the attic and it had damaged a hot water piper and it was leaking everywhere.

"The attic was full of steam and I though it was smoke so I called the fire service.

"They told me that the electricity had come through the roof without damaging it and then hit the pipe.

"I found out my next door neighbour is without power and the power company said that there was a fault with a station somewhere."

The other house strike caused a fire which gutted a bungalow in Shotley, a man and his daughter managed to escape before the fire took hold of the property.

He said: "It's just utter carnage, it's like a bomb's gone off really. It's soul destroying.

"The inside of the house is trashed, I don't know where we are going to go for now."