A Cork Harbour houseboat resident has told of his shock at seeing a “tornado” whipping towards him on Tuesday afternoon (21 May).

As Echo Live reports, Gavin Higgins was watching TV below deck on his converted classic RNLI lifeboat in Drake’s Pool when he was drawn to his cabin by a loud boom.

“It was a lovely day and I thought it was thunder, but I came up into my cabin and I saw this tornado making its way toward me,” Higgins says.

Video shot by passers-by shows the waterspout — the term for a whirlwind that forms over a body of water — whipping across the normally tranquil anchorage.

Luckily for Higgins, his houseboat the Lilly Wainright was unscathed in the incident.

“I always wanted to retire to Crosshaven and now I have,” the Doncaster native added. “I’m at home here, although I don’t know why God sent a tornado after me!”

Ireland is not known for such extreme weather events, but last December a tornado dealt significant damage to a number of moored motor cruisers in Co Leitrim, as previously reported on Afloat.ie.