Repairs to Lihou house due to begin this week
Work to repair Lihou house will start later this week as the island’s warden hopes to take advantage of low tides to bring scaffolding over to the island.
The house suffered damage to the roof, electrics and had one window blown out during Storm Ciaran two weeks ago, but high winds and unfavourable tides made visiting the house before the weekend impossible.
Warden Steve Sarre was on the island yesterday inspecting water damage inside and overseeing initial repairs to the house’s electrical system after water entered an electrical box in an outbuilding, causing a small fire.
The house is off-grid with power coming from solar panels and two diesel generators, and water from a bore hole that requires electrical power to work the pump
‘We are still assessing the damage. It may be that when we had the electrical fire it shorted the computer controls on the solar panels,’ Mr Sarre said.
‘One of the generators is OK, so at the moment the best we can do is run an extension cord up to the house.’
He hoped to get power back to the house today.
‘Without power there is no running water and we can’t even flush the toilets,’ he said. ‘But we probably can't get the system fully redone before the end of January.'
Mr Sarre said he had managed to get to the house the day before Storm Ciaran hit and had tried to prevent as much damage as possible by screwing doors shut.
‘But there wasn’t much we could do about with losing parts of the roof.’
He spent a lot of the week on the phone trying to speak to tradesmen to sort out the repairs, but was happy to receive one call out of the blue.
‘A roofer actually contacted me after reading about the damage in the Guernsey Press,’ he said.
‘T&C said they did the original roofing and are booked in to help.’
Insurers visited the island on Monday to assess the damage and Mr Sarre is hoping that a pay-out will cover a loss of earnings from cancelled bookings.
‘We were fully booked through 2024 and unfortunately are going to have to let people down,’ he said.
‘It will probably also mean we can’t hold our annual mince pie and mulled wine event and even the 5K may be in doubt. Both of these are important fundraisers for us.’
