Last night’s storm, in which the sky turned a greenish colour, was a pretty impressive if brief one. The wall of rain that came down reminded me monsoon/typhoon weather in southeast Asia. Although the storm lasted just over an hour, we got 52 millimetres (2 inches) of rain, 430 lightning strikes and a number of flooded-out roads. One of those lightning strikes killed a man who was taking shelter under a tree, which goes against every bit of thunderstorm safety advice I’ve ever heard.
While biking on the way to work this morning, I saw this felled tree at the corner of Dundas and Golden:
Police cordoned off the street and people from Accordion City’s public works department were working out how to remove the tree without crushing the van pinned under it:
Here’s a closeup of where the branch split from the trunk:
Here’s a collection of interesting memes, pictures, an cartoons floating around the internet that I…
Tap to see the source. This is yesterday’s daily New Yorker cartoon, created by Brendan…
C’mon, let it not be Asians this time. Last time was pretty bad. Here’s the…
Jon Stewart’s right, and we’ve been here before. Where we are now, I’ve been before…
Poppies thrive in overturned soil, which is why they bloom in battlefields. I’m in the…
In times of high dudgeon, there’s a tendency to throw integrity out the window. One…
View Comments
"One of those lightning strikes killed a man who was taking shelter under a tree, which goes against every bit of thunderstorm safety advice I’ve ever heard."
Really? I was taught from childhood *never* to shelter under a tree during a thunder storm.
My understanding was that it's not okay to be under a solitary tree (or any exposed, elevated surface) in a clear area, as this carries greater risk of lightning strike. But it's (relatively) okay to be in say, a forest, as long as you're not directly under a tree and in a low-lying area, not in the tallest stand of trees. Presumably in the forest the bigger risk is dying from asphyxiation due to a forest fire ignited by a lightning strike.