An Addison man is credited with alerting his neighbors after a lightning strike ignited an apartment fire early Monday.
Dave Priestman had a hard time falling asleep Sunday night because of the storms. Earlier in the day, he heard about a lightning strike that ignited a house fire in Allen.
When he finally fell asleep, lightning struck an apartment building on the 4800 block of Westgrove Drive. Priestman lives a few doors down.
"3 a.m., I woke up to that loud bang," Priestman said. "I let those people know because I didn't see anybody moving around, so I called 91l, started hammering on doors and yelled, 'Fire!'"
Priestman, a deacon at his church and a fulltime Uber driver, knocked on the first level units first, then made his way up to the second floor.
"I'd do it again. I hope somebody would knock on my door one day," Priestman said.
Two second-floor units are a total loss. Surrounding units have smoke and water damage. Families returned on Monday afternoon to pickup household items.
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Nobody was injured, authorities said.
Authorities said lightning was the likely cause of at least five fires in North Texas beginning Sunday night through Monday morning.
