Wild weather sparks fires, headaches across Central NC
Severe storms and lightning caused numerous problems across Central North Carolina on Wednesday evening.
Fires apparently started by lightning were reported in Apex, Cary and Raleigh and Fuquay-Varina.
In Apex, firefighters battled a house fire in the Ashley Downs neighborhood off Olive Chapel Road.
A house also caught fire in Cary when it was struck by lightning.
No one was injured in the fire, which happened in the 100 block of Draymore Way.
In Raleigh, there was a fire that went through a home's roof. It too was caused by a lightning strike.
It happened in the 8200 block of Crane's View Place W, and was quickly controlled by firefighters.
The home's owner told ABC11 that he heard a loud crack and smelled smoke. He was the only one home at the time and was not injured.
In Fuquay-Varina, another fire was reported, though it wasn't confirmed late Wednesday that lightning was the cause.
It happened on Tustin Court.
At one point, there were nearly 180 cloud-to-ground lightning strikes in just 15 minutes in western Wake County.
In Fayetteville, flooding was a problem.
On Bobby Jones Drive in the Baywood Golf Club community, water entirely covered the road.
No homes had been evacuated as of late Wednesday night.
At 9:18 p.m., the National Weather Service issued a tornado warning for Franklin County until 9:45 p.m. But the warning was abruptly canceled as the storm which prompted the warning quickly weakened and fell below several weather limits, the NWS said.
"The storm no longer appears capable of producing a tornado," the NWS added.
The Franklin County Sheriff's Office said it had not received any reports of damage or unusually severe weather.
In Cary, the Carolina Railhawks U.S. Open Cup soccer match against the New England Revolution was delayed by the storms.
WATCH: LIGHTNING IN CARY
The match started at 7:30 p.m. but the teams only played about 10 minutes before the lightning forced players off the field and fans scrambling out of the stands.
The storm front delayed the match for more than two hours. At 10 p.m. the action finally resumed in Cary.
