Wow, close call..!!!

Zeldman

Zeldman

Touchdown! Greaser!
Joined
Jun 13, 2014
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high desert NM
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Display name:
Billy
I wish I had a picture but it happened too quickly.

My wife was out tending to her garden this evening. Thunderstorms are pretty much all quadrants. I was watching one on radar as it is moving towards us. I then saw on the radar that the nearest lightning strike was 6.9 miles away.

Ok, time for her to come in.

As I stepped out the front door a flash of lightning hit the ground about 40-45 yards away.

ZAP FLASH BaBOOM..!!!!

I saw 2 flashes and heard the lightning, and the thunder and it was all instantaneous. A big cloud of dust shot up about 20 feet in the air like a cheap movie special effect. I did not have to tell my wife that is was now time to come in as she pretty much figured that out. She was only about 25 yards away.
 
She’s very lucky. That’s about close enough to get a good jolt through the feet if it’s wet enough and all the right (wrong) conditions are met.
 
Glad she was ok.

Have had two houses hit by lightning. While home.

It’ll wake you up.
 
Glad your wife is OK. I can only remember 2 or so lighting storms in the last 23 years in Juneau
 
Lachlan said:
She’s very lucky. That’s about close enough to get a good jolt through the feet if it’s wet enough and all the right (wrong) conditions are met.
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Everything was still dry, the rain had not hit us yet. I was worried about a secondary bolt hitting the dry grass and starting a fire.
 
AKBill said:
Glad your wife is OK. I can only remember 2 or so lighting storms in the last 23 years in Juneau
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Only 2.?? I swear I heard more thunder in Juneau that I usually hear in Gallup during monsoon season...:lol::lol:

In the 4 1/2 years I spent in Kotzebue, I remember one clap of thunder right over town. The kids ran crying into the house and people were calling the radio station asking if there was a terrorist attack.....:frown2:
 
Zeldman said:
Only 2.??
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Got to remember I do work in an underground mine 55hr/wk...:rolleyes: Truthfully speaking I cant remember the last lighting storm here.


Weather records from 1970 through 2001 at three stations; Yakutat, Juneau, and Annette Island were examined and thunderstorm days were noted. During the period, Juneau recorded a total of 16 storms, resulting in an average of one thunderstorm every 1.9 years.
 
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Whoa, lucky you!

I once watched 4 people get hit by ‘something’. They were outside on the deck under an umbrella. I saw a flash or something and all 4 people reacted, got up and came inside looking confused. I told them that it looked like a flash hit the umbrella (?!?). A couple of them complained of a funny taste in their mouths (fillings). It took awhile for all of us to realize what (almost) happened.

Lucky!


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I've been close enough to feel the charge through the air and my brother had it jump out of an electrical outlet and shock him. (2 separate occasions) Of course then there was the time it hit my house, lit it on fire and I lost the second story.
 
Was standing in the hangar one day, watching a decent storm roll in. Took a strike on the ramp about 15 feet the other side of the door I was leaning against. Excavated a pretty good sized hole in the ramp. Ten minutes later, we took another ramp strike about 100 feet away, with an even bigger hole. Within a week we took another strike on the ramp. In the 14 or so years I’ve been on the flight line, those were the only strikes anyone can remember where it actally hit the ramp and not the dirt past our hangars.
 
Some years ago, I saw a strike hit my neighbor's chimney. It blew the top three feet of bricks all over the front yard, roof and out onto the road. I knew they were home, so I ran over to see if everything was good. Turns out, they were on a lower level covered deck at the same end of the house. I asked him if everyone was ok. He looked at me, confused. I told him that his house just got struck by lightning and that his chimney was all over the yard. He said they knew it was close, but they didn't realize it hit the house. Incredibly, they were sitting 20 ft from where it hit the chimney. I can't imagine how loud that had to be. I was inside across the street and it lifted me out of my chair.
 
By the way...Lightening does strike in the same place twice... As a child I remember watching for the strike that invariably hit the back corner of our lot during many TSTMS...Usually didn't disappoint me...

Closest strike to me was about 100 yards... Hit the building across the street from where I worked...BOOM! Nature can be a b/tch!
 
She was damn lucky. I know two people killed by lightning. One was a five year old boy. His grandfather sent him out in the yard to pick up his toys. The lightning hit a tree and traveled through a root he was standing on. The other was my sister's roommate. She and her boyfriend were running across the beach holding hands, it hit her head, killed her, burned her boyfriend's hand.
 
My great grandfather also killed by a lightening strike when it caught his cabin on fire and he perished.
 
many years ago some buddies and I were driving on the highway in a really heavy TS. It was raining so hard we could barely see the car in front of us, and traffic speed was down pretty low. Then then the car in front of us exploded...sort of. The lightning hit the road surface between our two cars. We thought the car in front of us had just blown up.

About a year ago my neighbor's house took a strike, probably on the power line. He lost most of his electronics, but the most expensive damage was to his refrigerator. The power surge had welded the icemaker valve open and it flooded his kitchen and finished basement. They weren't home when it happened.
 
I cannot conceive of someone not realizing it had hit their house. Years ago I was a counselor at a summer camp and was about 100' away from where lightning hit a tree in front of one of the cabins...while all the kids were running around it during the cabin cookout. It blew half the bark off the tree, but miraculously did not hit anyone and there were kids within 10' of the tree. It got my attention and everyone got inside.
 
My Mom was very afraid of lightning and thunderstorms, to the point she refused to use electrical appliances, run water, or use the phone during a thunderstorm.

I remember even after we got her a cordless phone for her birthday one year, she still wouldn't use it during a thunderstorm.

I used to think she was paranoid, but even now, when a bad thunderstorm rolls in, I find myself avoiding running water, for fear some bolt of lightning might jump out and electrocute me. I still run appliances, though.
 
Recent Story: Wife was taking the dogs out to the dog run in the back yard while a thunderstorm was in process. I'm away on business. She's standing there waiting for them to do their business holding an umbrella, when lighting strikes the children's play fort in the neighbors yard next door. Blinding flash of light, deafening boom. She and the dogs take off running while she's praying every prayer she knows. She calls me crying because all she could think about was our daughter sitting in her high chair eating breakfast and no one would be there to help. I got yelled at for not being there, lol.

Older story: I was ~3yrs old, sleeping on the floor against a bedroom window in our family lake cabin. Octagon shaped home, floor-to-ceiling windows all around. Heavy t-storm, lighting strikes a tree which sits a 2-3' away from the window I was sleeping next to. Splits the tree in half, blows out the two windows I was against, and fried the electric appliances. Parents came in there and couldn't wake me up for a minute or two, which scared the hell out of them. I don't recall any of it except the glass on the floor. My mother maintains that it was God warning me in advance and is a frequent excuse used for " that's what's wrong with me", lol.
 
Wow...shocking stories....!!!!

Back in my racing days I was driving the fuel truck home, a bobtail that holds 1500 gallons in 5 compartments. After midnight, driving through a terrible rain storm. Raining so bad that I was using a flash light to shine down through the driver window to keep sight of the yellow line. Suddenly a blinding flash, I saw it in front of me and both sides of me and instant thunder. I thought this was it since 4 of the 5 compartments were nothing but fumes. I dropped the flashlight and I went to the floor. Then I realized I was still among the living and no one is at the wheel.

I got back in the seat, got the flashlight, found the yellow line again and continued. About 5 miles down the road I was out of the rain, so I pulled over to check the truck. An 18 wheeler pulled in behind me. He had been behind me and did not know I was there. He said the lightning lit up my truck like a light bulb.

Another time at night I was climbing up to altitude. I had contacted center and got my IFR clearance. I was in the clouds, so I had my flash light and was checking the wings to see how fast the ice was accumulating. Suddenly a yellowish/greenish flash went off in front of me, temporarily flash blinding me in my right eye. The thunder was instantaneous. All of the radios went to instant static. The GPS went off line and was resetting itself. The A/P disconnected. I grabbed the yoke and started hand flying.

I started trying to get a radio back. My vision started returning to normal. I reset the A/P and it was working. About 15 minutes later I started hearing voices through the static. Another 5 minutes later I was able to re-establish communications. I told center I thought I might have been hit by lightning. He just replied, yep, you went off our screen for a few seconds, then came back as a secondary target. We have you completely back now. PD to 13,000. The radar, an old Bendix, never worked again.

The plane (C-414) had some previous minor damage to the nose cone and had a thin layer of bondo covering it. All the bondo was gone and there was a small crack, about 2 inches long in the fiber glass. On the bottom of the nose cone was a small hole, like someone had drilled a 1/4 inch hole through the fiber glass.

After reading other stories here, I won't be letting my wife out in her garden with thunderstorms in the area, unless we are in Juneau, Yakutak or Annette Island.....:lol:
 
EdFred said:
Of course then there was the time it hit my house, lit it on fire and I lost the second story.
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You mean you had a lightning strike and it burned the second floor of your house, but that is another story...??

Actually, I hope no one was on the second floor at the time.



LoneAspen said:
My Mom was very afraid of lightning and thunderstorms, to the point she refused to use electrical appliances, run water, or use the phone during a thunderstorm.
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My mom was like that. I am starting to feel the same way. Except for the phone. I don't think lightning can strike through a cell phone...I hope.
 
Zeldman said:
You mean you had a lightning strike and it burned the second floor of your house, but that is another story...??

Actually, I hope no one was on the second floor at the time.






My mom was like that. I am starting to feel the same way. Except for the phone. I don't think lightning can strike through a cell phone...I hope.
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Two story house - well 1.5 story house. Second floor went whoof. $96,000 later I had a new second floor. Best $400 in insurance I ever spent. Oh, yeah, it happened 5 days after I closed on it.
 
I never understood why houses in the US are not required to have lightning rods. It's like building a house on the beach and just putting the slab down directly in the sand, no stilts. :)

The closest my wife has been to a lightning bolt is about 100yds. It was far enough that it wasn't deafening but close enough to scare the bejesus out of her where she jumped up (we were sitting on the deck enjoying the rain on the roof), screamed and ran inside. I was laughing the rest of the day (yes, I am an azz .... errr ... a husband). She still shakes whenever she recalls that one. :)
I have been maybe 50yds from a strike before. It lit up our chainlink fence like a Christmas tree and made my hair stand up. Electricity is fun.
 
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