|
Enlightening
Facts about Lightning
Once the leading edge of a thunderstorm approaches to within 10 miles,
you are at immediate risk due to the possibility of lightning strokes coming from
the overhanging anvil cloud. Because of this, many lightning deaths and injuries
occur with clear skies directly overhead.
Average Lightning stroke is 6-8 miles long
Average thunderstorm is 6-10 miles wide.
Average thunderstorm travels at a rate of 25 miles per hour.
On average, thunder can only be heard over a distance of 3-4 miles, depending
on humidity, terrain, and other factors.
Approximately 100,000 thunderstorms occur in the United States each year.
Approximately 10% of all thunderstorms are severe enough to produce high winds,
flash floods, and tornadoes.
Thunderstorms cause an average of 200 deaths and 700 injuries in the United
States alone each year, most of which could be prevented.
Back to Top of Lightning Facts
Lightning hits field, injures
15 in Forney, Texas
From a Dallas-Fort Worth newspaper (August 29, 1995)
A bolt of lightning jolted a high school football field during afternoon practice
yesterday, injuring 12 players, two coaches and a student trainer in the small town
of Forney, 20 miles east of Dallas.
Sophomore Clay Jones, 15, suffered cardiac arrest and burns. He remained in
critical condition last night at Baylor University Medical Cetner in Dallas.
Three students were in stable condition last night, five were still being evaluated
and four others, including the female trainer, were treated and released, said Jeff
Place, the evening administrator at Baylor.
The coaches-Brad Turner and Horlos Cotton Barrett - were released from the
Medical Center of Mesquite about 8 p.m., a hospital spokeswoman said.
A light drizzle had just stopped when lightning hit the football field at 3:56
p.m. during daily practice of the combined varsity and junior varsity squads. The
jolt left more than 30 players and coaches sprawled on the turf.
"We all hit the ground, and it was quiet for two or three seconds until
they told us to hit the fieldhouse," said Oscar Rivera, 17, a varsity linebacker.
Coaches of the District 12-3A team stayed on the field, giving first aid to
two junior varsity players who remained on the ground - Jones and sophomore Nick
Purvis.
"It was like an explosion," said Rivera. You could feel it, and you
smelled it burning."
Defensive end Raphael Dewberry said: "We heard a thump, and we all hit
the ground. I was real close to one of the guys who got hit bad. I felt like a thump
in my helmet, like somebody hit me with a bat or something. We all laid on the ground
and on the count of three we all ran into the fieldhouse."
Once inside the fieldhouse, the players prayed.
"Right after we prayed was when they said they got a pulse on Clay,"
said Sean Daugherty, 17, a varsity linebacker.
"If this kid makes it, it's probably due to some fast acting by the coaches"
who administered cardiopulmonary resusciatation, Forney Police Chief Rick Barnes
said.
Daugherty and Rivera were among dozens of players and parents who converged
at the Baylor emergency room last night, keeping tabs on the injured who had arrived
still dressed in their football jerseys.
Addendum. Clay Jones died from his injuries a few weeks later. Lightning reportedly
struck his helmet and the jolt of electricity sent him into cardiac arrest. A week
prior to his death, hist parents said that their son's vital signs were strong but
that his brain was swollen and that their biggest concern was potential brain damage.
They said then that doctors had told them it could be days or weeks before the extent
of damage was known.
Back to Top of Lightning Facts
WCSC Investigating Use of Skyscan Lightning
Detector
The Washington County Soccer Club is evaluating SkyScan, the first computerized
hand-held lightning/thunderstorm detector. The SkyScan has been recently tested for
accuracy at the District IV All-Star Little League Baseball Finals in Lake Wale,
Florida; Duke Soccer Camp in Durham, North Carolina; the U.S. Senior Open at Congressional
Country Club in Bethesda, Maryland; and during football practice at Texas Christan
University (TCU) in Fort Worth, Texas. The storm cell that went through Fort Worth
on August 29, 1995 also passed through Forney, Texas where a young man died from
a lightning strike while on the football practice field.
SkyScan has received very positive comments from around the country. It detects
burst of electromagnetic radiation - in the forms of very low frequency radio signals
- generated by lightning flashes. The SkyScan device can determine the range of the
lightning flash up to 40 miles away.
WCSC's initial evaluation of the SkyScan product is favorable. It has been
accurate for the storms we have monitored. We hope to use the SkyScan detector to
help determine when to suspend or terminate games at the Bartlesville soccer complex.
More information is available upon request.
As an update, unfortunately, WCSC has not come up with a clear path on how to implement
the use of the Skyscan Lightning Detector. It has worked reasonably well when we
have been able to test it, but we cannot agree on a plan that would allow it to be
universally used at our fields. While this is discussed, our best course is to keep
informing and educating the public.
We welcome all suggestions on creating a policy that is reasonable to all people.
Remember, use common sense above all else. The Skyscan lightning detector or
any other weather detecting device should not be used by itself. To be truly applicable,
reports from local tv and radio stations, and weather radar should be used in conjunction
with the lightning detector.
Back to Top of Lightning Facts
Remember It's Only a Game
There comes a time when, regardless of all the built-in rules and safeguards,
safety of the players is subject to human guesswork.
The score is close in the second half. The two teams have played a hard fought
game. The sky is getting dark all the time and thunder rumbles in the distance.
The coaches and officials agree that unless they see lightning, the approaching
storm is far enough away to finish the game. What they don't know is they are already
in imminent danger. Thunder always means lightning...even if you can't see it. This
has always been one of the toughest calls in sports.
Nothing is the whole world is as important as a game in progress, and the temptation
to finish is only human. But, no game needs to be a life or death decision.
Everyone, parents, players, referees, coaches, need to work together to assess
the suitability of the weather while remembering that it is the final decision of
the referee to decide if a game is going to continue.
This is a big responsibility for you referees, and you must take it seriously.
Even if the danger to the players from lightning is relatively small, suspend the
game and get off the field to a place of safety.
For the rest of you, if you are at a game where you feel the weather is unsafe
but the referees will not suspend the game, you have every right to leave the game
and take your kids with you. A loss by forfeit is the worst that can possibly occur
if you leave a match before the referee has called for suspension. This is a relatively
small price to pay when compared to the alternative.
Back to Top of Lightning Facts
Lightning Strikes Again!
************************************************************************
THE KANSAS CITY STAR, April 3, 1998, Friday
HEADLINE: When sports becomes life and death
BYLINE: MIKE HENDRICKS
No one could have predicted the lightning bolt that almost killed
a high school soccer player Monday afternoon, but someone should have
foreseen the danger.
Why were those kids out in that kind of weather in the first place?
That's the question parents have been asking since 14-year-old
Katie Zemel's heart and lungs stopped during a game between Blue
Valley North and Shawnee Mission South high schools.
We were under a tornado watch. It was raining - hard at times -
and we had been alerted repeatedly of the potential for thunder and
lightning.
Did no one have sense enough to come in out of the rain?
Well, no. This was soccer, and tradition holds that you play in
the rain at least until lightning is seen or thunder is heard.
Trouble is, lightning travels miles in an eye blink and is
especially hazardous at the beginning of a storm.
One weather forecaster said 3,000 lightning bolts struck in our
vicinity that day. Unfortunately, one of the first slammed into the
turf near Katie.
No one has affixed blame for her injuries. All concerned say they
followed proper procedures by not stopping the game earlier.
But why is it necessary to even take the chance by playing in a
driving rain?
Simple answer: Sports madness.
It's so all-consuming these days that the adults who run youth
sports have trouble placing athletic competition in a proper
perspective.
I'm not just talking about the high school level, but all junior
sports - the Little Leagues, too.
Storm threat? Try to get the game in, if you can. Got to build
that record, make that tournament. Give it your 110 percent.
It's a madness in which adults promote participation to the point
that nearly every other activity is secondary to soccer, hockey,
baseball, football, basketball, volleyball, and on and on.
Parents start their sons a year late in school so they'll be
bigger than their peers when it comes time for competition.
The madness fills leagues so full that practice fields and gyms
are forever booked up. Which means basketball practice for
grade-schoolers continues until 10 p.m. on some school nights, while
other kids get up before dawn so they can get rink time for hockey.
Sports is No. 1.
Skip practice for schoolwork, piano lessons, Scouts, church?
What's wrong with you, kid? You're going to let down your coach
and the team.
Winning may not be everything but being part of the team is, and
that means slogging across a rain-soaked soccer field without
complaint, when any fool knows you ought to be inside.
At the very moment Katie Zemel was somewhere between life and
death Monday afternoon, the Blue Springs and Shawnee Mission
Northwest girls soccer teams were playing at St.Thomas Aquinas High
School.
It had been raining hard there, also.
Some parents say they notified the referees that they had heard
thunder; yet the game went on. Then when they learned of the
lightning strike a few miles away, some Shawnee Mission Northwest
mothers pleaded for the game to stop.
"We told the referee that a girl was coming into the hospital
code blue," one mother said, "and this (spectator) overheard us and
said, 'Just because someone codes doesn't mean they're dead. "'
The spectator didn't want the game stopped, you see. There were
four minutes left. Blue Springs was behind 4-0.
How can you expect people to have sense enough to come in out of
the rain when they have no sense at all?
Back to Top of Lightning Facts
Berea soccer player dies in lightning
strike
LEXINGTON, Ky. (Sep 6, 1996 - 18:42 EST) -- An 18-year-old Berea College woman
soccer player died today after being struck by lightning during practice Thursday.
Haley Brooke Herring, of Piedmont, Ala. was struck just before 6 p.m. Thursday,
the Fayette County Coroner's office reported. She was taken by ambulance to the burn
unit at the University of Kentucky Hospital in Lexington, where she died about 6:20
a.m. today, said Fayette County Coroner Dennis Penn.
Witnesses said Herring and other members of the soccer team had left the practice
field as a line of thunderstorms moved through the area Thursday evening. Herring
was struck just after the team returned to the field, according to witnesses. No
other players were reported injured.
College officials declined to release any details of the accident this morning.
A Berea spokeswoman, Wanda Nelson, said there would be a statement later today.
Back to Top of Lightning Facts
Additional Lightning Stories
Everyone Should Read
by Victor Matheson
Minnesota SYRA
Reprinted from Soccer Times and Smoke Signals
The tragedy involving referee Scott Wade reminds me of two personal experiences.
In June of 1991, as part of the Front Range Invitational Tournament in Colorado Springs,
CO, I was officiating a match at the lower level of fields at the U.S. Air Force
Academy. We could all see that bad weather was moving in-we had heard the thunder
and had seen the flashes of lightning in the distance-but we all wanted to get in
our games. The lightning seemed to be far away and none of us had seen lightning
hit the ground anywhere nearby.
About midway through the second half of my game, the storm rolled over the
mountains and lightning struck one of the upper fields. Scott Hamilton, an under-15
player from Denver, was directly hit by the blast. Although he survived, he was critically
injured and has permanent physical disabilities, which have prevented him from returning
to soccer in the five years since the incident. Three other players and the center
referee, a good friend of mine, also were hospitalized after the same strike spread
along the ground.
Two years ago, I suspended a high school game I was refereeing because of lightning
in the distance and an impending storm. Both coaches disagreed with my decision-they
argued that the lightning was still far away and posed no danger to the players or
fans-and asked, impatiently, if I was going to restart the game anytime soon.
After waiting about 15 minutes, I was walking from my car to the field to discuss
the situation with the coaches when lightning actually hit the stadium. Since both
teams had been sent to the locker room, no one was hurt and the only damage done
was to the stadium clock.
These two stories illustrate the important points about officiating. The primary
role of the referee is to ensure the safety of the players; propoerly identifying
safe playing conditions is one of the referee's most important duties.
As with the incident in Colorado, by the time you actually see lightning nearby,
it may be too late. If you see lightning hit the ground within a mile or two of your
location, you already have stayed outside too long. Soccer is only a game, and it's
not worth dying for. Ask Mr. Hamilton if he thinks the extra few minutes of playing
time back in 1991 were worth it.
The second story contains a message for both referees and coaches.
Referees, you are the ones who must make the decisions regarding the suitability
of the playing conditions, and you should not succumb to pressure from the coaches
when you think things are unsafe. Although it made me unpopular at the time, my decision
to stop the game that night may have saved somebody's life.
Coaches, you need to be part of the solution, not part of the problem. You
need to think about the safety of your players, not about the difficulty of rescheduling
games or the hassle of coming out to play on a different night.
The coaches on the occasion two years ago were willing to put their players'
lives in jeopardy because they didn't want to have to schedule a rematch. That seems
a little silly, doesn't it?
Finally, I have a note for everyone-parents, players, referees and coaches.
You need to work together to assess the suitability of the weather while remembering
that it is the final decision of the referee to decide if a game is going to continue.
This is a big responsibility for you referees, and you must take it seriously.
Even if the danger to the players from lightning is relatively small, suspend the
game and get off the field to a place of safety.
For the rest of you, if you are at a game where you feel the weather is unsafe
but the referees will not suspend the game, you have every right to leave the game
and take your kids with you. A loss by forfeit is the worst that can possibly occur
if you leave a match before the referee has called for suspension. This is a relatively
small price to pay when compared to the alternative.
Colombian soccer
player dies three days after being hit by lightning
Associated Press Oct. 27, 2002 3:49 p.m. BOGOTA, Colombia (AP)
Columbian soccer player Giovany Cordoba died Sunday, three days after
being struck by lightning while practicing.
The 24-year-old Cordoba had three heart attacks as a result of
Thursday's lightning strike. A hospital spokesman said he died of
"renal, pulmonary, cardiovascular and cerebral complications."
Hermam Gaviria, a teammate of Cordoba with Deportivo Cali and member of
Columbia's 1994 World Cup team, was killed by the lightning strike.
Back to Top of Lightning Facts
|
