Newport running club helps out fundraiser for lightning-struck church

Newport and District Running Club has a good relationship with nearby St Andrew's Church in nearby Church Aston, often using the church car park as a base to start runs from.

The church was hit by lightning in the course of storms back in August. Although the church's lightning rod protected the building itself from too much damage, all of its electronics were effectively destroyed.

A fundraiser for new equipment was set up by the community and now the Newport running club has donated £100 of its funds to the appeal.

Sarah Higginson from the running club said: "[Reverend Zoe Heming] was delighted with the donation and an opportunity to highlight the fundraising required – £15,000.

"The running club have a number of members that live in Church Aston or if not, use the car park on a regular basis to start runs, so we wanted an opportunity to give back. We would have loved to give more but as all our runs have been cancelled this year, our fundraising has been substantially lower.

"When we heard of the damage the lightning strike caused to the internal electrics and property the church rely on so much to conduct day-to-day services, even more so during Covid-19 such as projector, laptop, all sockets, boiler, heating, we were horrified.

"It’s a miracle that no one was hurt as people were in the church for a wedding rehearsal only hours beforehand."

Last weekend the running club held its latest virtual 10k race. Runners have been using social media to take part in 'races' and keep in touch.

Visit facebook.com/NewportDRC/ to learn more.