Oh that is so sad LD. All the photos, and particularly that portrait, gosh what a terrible loss. But I guess if you came away from that with your lives, then you were very lucky.
Yes, very lucky, as had we returned from a shopping trip a minute earlier, we would have been inside the house. The lightning struck just as we turned the corner approx 150 yards away from our driveway. I just had time to open the front door and check the cats had made it out through their flap before I isolated the gas and electric before closing the door again.
Fortunately for us, a council contractor was cutting grass to the field between our house and the sea’s edge, so verification it was a lightning strike was easy for the insurance company.
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Someone was looking after you that day LD. But what a horrible thing to have to go through. I mean, the immediate aftermath must have been a nightmare, finding somewhere to stay that night, getting changes of clothes for the next few days. And then the long term rebuilding your lives. I can’t begin to imagine 
That part was very easy. An acquaintance was part of a leisure park family and he moved us into one of their largest caravans for as long as we needed to find another house to rent until our wholly owned house was restored. We stayed in that few weeks old luxury 3 bed caravan for two months and then over we went into a bungalow until the day our keys were handed back to us. Our insurance at the time was The Economic and they could not have been more helpful or understanding, but alas, like all good things in this life, they are no longer in business and have been ‘absorbed’ by a much larger conglomeration 
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Oh so your house wasn’t burnt to the ground, but was fully restored? You were fortunate to have such a helpful insurance company. I can’t help thinking things might have been a lot more difficult with the huge national companies we have to deal with these days.
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That was mid '95, then during early January '98, a waterspout heading NE along the Solent, hit land and turned into a tornado, ripping the roof off together with a gable end and the rooms that were within the roof space. It also demolished over 100ft of solid 9" x 6ft high brick garden walling. That was not an easy claim with Churchill insurance and ended up with the ombudsman due to inept claims management via their nominated loss adjusters, who became involved in very poor business-like behaviour. That inept behaviour cost Churchill over double what the claim should have cost them if the remedial work had been properly managed and undertaken correctly. Then there was compensation to be added at the end before our claim was finally closed. Needless to say, we did not insure again through Churchill!
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Oh good grief!! Are you still in the same house?
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Oh no. We sold up and moved about 2 miles inland and about 10 crow flown miles eastwards. We bought this house as its location appealed to us (opposite a green) and as it had been empty for about a year, we completely remodelled it and added a full width rear extension. Since we moved in, we have extended further to the rear and turned the bungalow at the end of the plot into my music workshop and a mini-gym. This house will suit us now until we leave in long wooden boxes for our final journey up the big chimney 
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Phew, I’m so glad you got away from that house - it surely must have been cursed!!
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We do believe it was. During our 1st insurance claim, we discovered it had suffered severe roof damage about 15yrs before we bought it. It was very prominent in the general wind flow pattern compared to others in the vicinity.
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That is spooky .
To whomsoever moved this string → you could have at least spelled LIGHTNING correctly!!
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