What's the closest you ever came to being struck by lighting?

[SeekerOfTruth007]

I was about 10 or 15 feet away from a Pine Tree when a "Bolt from the blue" hit the pine tree and killed it instantly. It scared the hell out of me, and the only thing I could do was repent to God for being angry about something a few minutes earlier. That's how scary that was.

I just read an article about a 15 years old teen who was zapped by lightning just yesterday and survived with "minor burns" in spite of being knocked unconscous for "several minutes".

[Anonymous]

I was at work when I was a manager at a children's museum. My employee in the outdoor area radioed me that they saw lightning nearby. This was always super critical because the area had these giant metal things that spun water to a cauldron outside, and various other metal components and a bunch of large trees. It was basically a lightning death trap. I ran out there to help get visitors inside along with my employee. However, one family refused to leave. The mom was taking her sweet sweet time slowly walking. We were never supposed to touch visitors in anyway, but this is one time where I told my staff member to grab the kids by the hand and get them inside because I could see more and more lightning nearby.

He'd just hustled the kids inside, and the mom had just gotten in the door when lightning struck. My entire vision went completely white. For a few seconds I could see nothing but white. Next thing I knew myself and my staffer were on the ground. Everyone around us was screaming, and I thought for sure he'd been struck, but he turned around and started asking me if I'd been struck. We were INCREDIBLY LUCKY no one was hurt. Next day, came to work, stepped in the outside area, and I could see the exact spot about a foot off where I'd been trying to get inside where the lightning had struck because you could literally see the pattern, like a vein, in the concrete. It was wild. A few months later, we had another strike hit a small metal pipe in the ground that was exposed because it was being fixed due to a leak. I really hated lightning calls because I can't imagine had any of this hit a child or my staff.

[Beckybooboo]

Last summer, I had just gotten home from the grocery store and was carrying groceries from the car. I was walking out of the garage for the last two bags and I saw a flash and then the loudest bang I have ever heard. I actually fell lol The funny thing is it wasn't even storming. I could hear rumbles of thunder in the distance but nothing close. Oh, and I don't know what it struck, I didn't see any damage to anything.

[Staximus]

Damn that's pretty close, dude. I was about a hundred yards from a lightning strike on the shore of lake Mead. I was on a jet ski going across the lake. In between the shore and me, I was the highest point on the water. Lightning also struck across the street from my house at a park about 50 yards away, right before I was going to walk out the front door.

[Ironic_Method]

We lived in the middle of nowhere once upon a time and our only neighbor lived across from us. Lightning struck the tree that was 10ft from our house - splitting it, the pond in the backyard that killed all the frogs in it, and the neighbor's house so it caught fire.

[NathanDavis]

I really have no idea how close, or maybe not close at all I was but...

but I ended up deaf and blind for about two full minutes, confused... and with a very weird sensation all over my body, lmfao...

all I saw was an instant purple flash all over, and then nothing much... heard the loudest FUS RO DAH!! ever like it was coming out of my chest... and then I my ears wound not stop ringing

but I don't know... where that thing hit

[zagor]

Fortunately lightning is rare around here, except in the mountains. Although a guy in my town was killed by it in his driveway about 15 years ago.

I was working back in Virginia one time at a customer site and I stayed an extra half hour because the lightning was so heavy I didn't want to go out in the parking lot.

[DryGermanGuy]

Outside hiking or bicycling and then getting surprised by a thunderstorm.

[Ariesman81]

Years ago, a ⚡ hit the ground near our job site. The ground was so saturated that it travelled and dropped everyone to their knees.

[Anonymous]

Lightening struck the tree outside our home. That's it.