Fear of lightning is one of the most common phobias, and about ten percent of all drivers who are caught by a thunderstorm at the top of a hill tend to get down to the lowlands as soon as possible. However, although almost everyone is afraid of being struck by lightning, in reality this happens extremely rarely. The probability of being hit by lightning over the course of their entire life is only 1 in 3000 (a number of sources estimate this probability even lower), and the probability of being hit within a year is only one in 700000.
However, these statistics are fairly general and there are several variables that can increase your chances of being struck by lightning. For example, thunderstorms are more common in the southeastern United States, and much more lightning than in the rest of the country. However, you hardly need to worry - unless, of course, you are one of the ten people described below.
10. Jim Lamei was hit twice by lightning in his own home
One of the main safety measures that is recommended to be taken during a thunderstorm is to go indoors, but even in this case, the likelihood of being struck by lightning remains, Jim Lamy could confirm this to you. In 2009, Jim was taking a bath at his Pennsylvania home when lightning that shook his entire house struck water pipes and struck Jim through the water. From the impact, Jim was thrown up, and he lost consciousness, but the head remained on the surface. Fortunately, his son was there and managed to get Jim out before he drowned.
Six years later, Jim was struck by lightning again, this time through the sink in which he was washing dishes. He passed out again. Jim woke up later, with a pain in his stomach and sitting in a chair, not remembering how he got to the chair. Luckily for Jim, he survived both blows without any lasting injury, save for burn marks.
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9. Alexander Mandon - four strikes in six months
Alexander Mandon served in the Colombian army, but after being struck three times by lightning, he was sent home. Perhaps some of you thought that this was a sign from above on the theme that Mandon has nothing to do in the army - but, apparently, this is not so. In 2013, when Mandon was already at home, he was struck by lightning again. The only difference between the fourth blow and the three previous ones was that this time Alexander was treated by a city doctor.
The doctor ordered Alexander to be buried in the ground up to his head for two hours so that all the electricity would go out of his body into the ground. True, with this there was a little confusion - instead of burying Alexander vertically, the excavators first tried to bury him lying down and completely. Let's hope he got a refund in a few unpleasant minutes.
8. Bob Edwards - three hits, with two of them on the same street
What are the chances of being hit by lightning three times, and twice on the same street? How high are they? Are there any statistics on this? If anything, that's exactly what happened to Bob Edwards of North Carolina in 2012. The last time it happened was when he left the restaurant and headed for his truck. After the blow, Edwards had to crawl to a restaurant, where a little girl noticed him and ran to her father for help.
According to Edwards, the lightning strike was like a hammer strike in the chest. Several days after the incident, he still had ringing in his ears, blurred eyes, and a metallic taste in his mouth. In 1997, when he was last struck by lightning on the same street, rescuers had to pump him out. In addition, in 2009 he was struck by lightning in South Carolina. Fortunately, Bob did not suffer any serious physical injuries, but unfortunately, he suffered from PTSD. These incidents cost him his job, friends and family, he said.
7. Bill Kauern was struck by lightning twice
Dianna Kauern, author and presenter of the Physicist Girl YouTube channel, posted on the channel an interview with her father, who was struck twice by lightning. The first time lightning struck Bill Kauern, who lived on a farm, when he was 12 years old. He was swimming in the lake with his friends when he saw lightning strike the other end of the lake, about 11 kilometers away. He recalled that after the blow, he and his friends felt a tingling sensation in the water and decided that it was time to get out on the shore. As Bill walked to the house from the lake through a small forest, lightning struck a nearby tree, the discharge through the ground reached Bill. He woke up with a spinning head and could not remember where he was, but soon noticed a tree that was still smoking. According to his calculations, he lay unconscious for about an hour and a half.
The second time happened when Bill was already 35 years old, and because of a thunderstorm he decided to interrupt work on the street and continue it in the garage. Lightning struck a nearby tree again. According to Bill, at that moment he was bent over, but from the impact all his muscles contracted, and his body involuntarily straightened. Fortunately, everything was done without serious injuries.
6. Walter Summerford - three strikes while alive and one after death
Walter Summerford has become a kind of legend. The first time he was struck by lightning during World War I in 1918, a blow knocked him off his horse. After completing his service, the British Army Major moved to Vancouver. In 1924, while fishing, lightning struck a nearby tree, blasting Walter through the ground. In 1930, he was walking in the park, and - you guessed it - he was hit a third time. After this blow, Walter was paralyzed.
Walter died two years later and was buried. But the story did not end there. Four years after Summerford was buried, lightning struck his gravestone, adding a fourth strike to that list.
5. Casey Wagner - two hits in one second
They say that lightning does not hit the same place twice - but there are exceptions. In 2013, Casey Wagner was scheduled to take part in the annual Rednecks With Paychecks rodeo. Held in St. Joe, Texas, the event features hundreds of people racing off-road vehicles through the mud. During the competition, a thunderstorm began.
Wagner and his friends went in search of shelter, Casey stood near a tree, and then lightning struck him twice within one second. (Note: Don't hide from a thunderstorm under trees.) He said it looked like two shots, one after the other. Fortunately, Casey survived.
4. Michael Cannon, was hit three times
Alabama-born Michael Cannon was struck by lightning three times, once as a teenager and twice more when he was in his twenties. When sixteen-year-old Michael was setting up a fence with his father, lightning struck the fence 800 meters away. The shock went through the fence and hit Michael. According to him, he "literally saw the ball lightning rolling down the fence."
The second time, Michael was struck by lightning while working under a truck. She hit the ground, but got to Michael because the ground was wet. The third time he was visiting his friend and inspecting an old car in the shed, when lightning struck his hands, singing his hair on them and knocking out Michael.
3. Beth Peterson, hit twice
Beth Peterson wrote a book about being struck by lightning and called it Life After being struck by lightning. The first incident occurred in July 1992, when Beth was working as a military specialist in Fort Benning, Georgia. She went outside during a thunderstorm and came under a direct lightning strike, without any guides. According to Beth, she fell into a state of clinical death, and God gave her a choice: to return to Earth or stay in Heaven. She was told that if she returned to Earth, it would hurt her, but she would have the opportunity to help many people.
Then, nearly a year later, while Beth was still living in Georgia and trying to relieve stress from the first strike, she was struck by lightning a second time. Beth suffered both emotionally and physically. Now she is terrified of a thunderstorm, she has all ten toes amputated and suffers from headaches.
2. Roy Sullivan, survived seven hits
Roy Sullivan is officially recognized by the Guinness Book of Records as the person who was struck by lightning the most. Roy was certainly slightly more likely to be defeated than everyone else, as he was a ranger in Shenandoah National Park in Virginia. He spent a lot of time outdoors and in the woods and was struck by lightning several times while on duty. As a result of one of these incidents, all the hair on his head was burned.
After the third blow, Sullivan began to assume that all the forces of nature took up arms against him. It was reported that at some point Roy even tried to run away from the cloud, which, as it seemed to him, was chasing him, but this still did not save him from being hit. In 1983, Roy committed suicide, but this had nothing to do with lightning. Presumably, this was the result of unrequited love.
1. Melvin Roberts, 11 lightning strikes
In 2011, South Carolina's Melvin Roberts made the headlines for being struck by lightning six times. In 2015, he claimed that he was beaten five more times during this period. This happened once when he was sitting on the porch, and twice while working on the lawn mower. His wife is sure that during a thunderstorm she should stay as far away from Melvin as possible, because: "Someone will have to call for help." It is impossible to be repeatedly struck by lightning without gaining fame.
Roberts's medical records are probably stacked up to the ceiling, since he is a famous local doctor. According to Roberts, being struck by lightning is like being toasted from the inside out. Unfortunately, so many blows could not pass completely without a trace. Roberts says he suffers from headaches, memory lapses, speech problems and damage to the nervous system. Roberts regrets that he has problems even with the memories of his own childhood.
Dmitry Oskin