A house was hit by lightning and the River Ray burst its banks as Swindon was hit with a month's worth of rainfall overnight.

Several parts of Swindon were left submerged after the major thunderstorm overnight, which resulted in flooding across the town.

The downpour began on Sunday night, with scores of lightning strikes and rumbles of thunder, and continued into the early hours of Monday.

At 12.59am, fire crews from Swindon and Westlea, and two from Stratton, rushed to a house on Bideford Close in Park North, which had been hit by lightning.

Dorset & Wiltshire firefighters confirmed there was no fire in the incident in what was a busy night for the service who were called out multiple times across the two counties.

62mm of rain fell between 1am and 2am alone - more than the September average of 60mm.

This resulted in River Ray bursting its banks later on Monday.

A Thames Water spokesperson said: “Our network engineers have checked the area by the Swindon and Cricklade Railway and the River Ray has burst its banks there."

Elsewhere several of the town’s venues were shut due to the weather with the STEAM Museum, West Swindon Library and Kidz About indoor play area all closing due to the floods.

The Link Centre also was forced to close on Monday after the electricity supplying the whole building was severed.

A spokesperson for GLL said: “Last night’s torrential rain has caused significant flooding to Swindon’s Link Centre.

“Flood water overwhelmed the plant room, cutting out the electricity supply to the entire building.

“There is also water ingress at ground floor level.  The team is awaiting specialist electrical engineers to attend the site.

“Once the electricity supply has been made safe, they will then be able to begin pumping water from the building and at that point will be in a better position to assess the damage.”

Bus routes operated by both Swindon Bus Company and Stagecoach were also diverted throughout the morning as water remained on the town’s roads.

When asked about the flooding situation on Monday, a Swindon Borough Council spokesperson said: “Services are running as normal.

"There were some reports of excess surface water on a number of roads across the Borough, but this is receding now."