'It's heartbreaking': Nine cows die after being hit by power cable during Storm Darragh

A farmer in Cornwall has said he is "heartbroken" after nine of his cows were killed by a fallen power line during Storm Darragh.

Eric Murley has been running the farm at High Bojewyan, near Pendeen along with his wife and three sons since 1976. But he said he has never experienced anything like this.

On the night of Saturday 7 December, strong winds tore down a power cable across one of his fields.

Eric said: "These animals were sheltering from the wind behind a hedge, lying down quietly sheltering from the wind and this high voltage cable came down right on top of them and killed the lot of them, nine of them lying down in a line."

He added: "[It's] something I’d never even thought about, something I never would’ve thought would happen but there we are, it has happened and now we have to deal with it.

"The fact that we’ve reared these from freshly-born cows, they were around two years old, beef animals, we’ve reared them calves, right up until now and all we’ve got now is nine dead animals, it’s heartbreaking to be honest.

"But we’re all safe, we haven’t been hurt and neither has anybody else so we must be thankful for that."

Storm Darragh brought 90mph winds to parts of the West Country, after a rare red weather warning was issued for the early hours of Friday.

Thousands of homes were left without power throughout the weekend, according to the National Grid.

Train services to much of Devon and Cornwall were cancelled due to debris blocking the lines, while flights to and from Bristol and Exeter airports saw disruption, with long delays and cancellations particularly prevalent in Bristol on Saturday 7 December.