Fowler Associates Labs

Florida Teenager, Woman Struck by Lightning

June 26, 2006

Strong thunderstorms brought some much-needed rain to parts of the Mobile-Pensacola Area on Friday afternoon and produced lightning that injured at least two people. The strikes happened in Beulah, Florida, near Pensacola.

Richard Gordon, who lives on Rebel Road in Beulah, says Bobby McKay and McKay's parents were doing work for him, getting ready to paint a metal fence on his property around 2:45 Friday afternoon when lightning struck in the yard.

McKay collapsed and his parents went to help him. Gordon said the boy had to be revived at the scene after going into cardiac arrest. Emergency crews came and brought The 14-year-old-boy to Sacred Heart Hospital in Pensacola, where he was listed as in serious condition.

Minutes later, in a separate incident just a couple of miles away, 20 year old Brandy Turner was washing clothes inside her home on Beulah Road near Mobile Highway when she was burned during a lightning strike.

Tucker's father says his daughter suffered three burns to her stomach and was also taken to Sacred Heart Hospital, but that she wasn't hurt seriously.