NEW YORK, Aug 13 — A lightning bolt that struck during a fast-moving storm injured five people, three critically, at a park in the centre of Poughkeepsie, New York, yesterday afternoon, the police and the mayor of the Hudson Valley city said.
The lightning hit at 4:06pm, at Mansion Square Park, a popular gathering spot, Mayor Rob Rolison said.
Three people were unresponsive and two were conscious but injured, the police said. Rescue workers performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation on the three unresponsive victims, who were taken to the trauma center at Vassar Brothers Medical Centre in Poughkeepsie.
A hospital spokesman, Tim Massie, said they were in critical condition. They were admitted to the hospital’s intensive care unit. All three were men in their late 40s to early 50s who had been sitting together on the same park bench, he said.
The other victims were taken to MidHudson Regional Hospital in Poughkeepsie. Their conditions were not immediately available.
The victims were struck on the north side of the park, the police said. The mayor said that there were scorch marks on a nearby tree and that wooden slats on the bench had been knocked off, an indication of where the lightning had struck.
Leading up to the episode, the skies darkened quickly in the area over the park and there were several loud thunderclaps, the mayor said.
Two witnesses reported seeing a bolt of lightning strike near the group, then smoke and fire, the police said.
This year, there have been 25 lightning deaths nationally, according to the National Weather Service. That number includes Richard Garlock, 34, and Jenea Macleod, 32, who were killed Wednesday at a cemetery in Batavia, New York, according to the service.
Based on reported deaths and injuries, the service estimated the odds of any one person being struck by lightning in a given year at 1 in 1.2 million. — The New York Times
