A Kenyan female primary school teacher is counting huge losses after she accidentally burned her house down as she was trying to to burn a snake that had entered her house.

Elizabeth Muthoni Gacheru from Kibingoti village in Ndia Constituency, Kirinyaga county was washing clothes when she saw a snake slithering into her house and then hid in her bedroom.

In a bid to flush the snake out of the house, Muthoni took a piece of cloth and lit it before throwing it into the bedroom where the snake was hiding.

She was however left in shock and panic as smoke started billowing from the house instead of the serpent.

It took the intervention of county government fire fighters to put out the inferno which had gutted parts of the house, roof, clothes and electronics leaving her counting losses estimated to be worth about 1 million Kenyan shilling.

The fate of the targeted snake is unclear.