Thursday, July 12, 2007

Man on religious mission struck by lightning

From WSVN-TV (Miami/Ft. Lauderdale):
Miami-Dade Air Rescue transported Hailu Kidane Marian, 40, to Jackson Memorial Hospital Sunday after he was struck by dry lightning while selling religious books. According to one customer, a lightning bolt struck as he walked door-to-door selling books along Northwest 199 Street and 78 Avenue Sunday afternoon. "I was buying a book from one of these guys, and there was one thunderstorm and thunder and then the second thunder, which was the lightning," explained Maria Martinez. "It was like a gunshot, and, when I turned around, I saw like a cloud of smoke and this one guy jumping, like basically being slammed on his feet. I guess he just fell back."
The man, a Seventh-Day Adventist on a summer missionary trip, went into cardiac arrest but was revived by Miami Dade Fire Rescue. The lightning strike was a case of "dry lightning," when lightning strikes when it is not raining.

The leader of the missionary group is described in the cited news article as saying "the group trusts God to provide a miracle" for Hailu Kidane Marian's recovery. (Why do they assume the lightning strike wasn't the miracle? As usual, God is given the credit for anything good, even if it's mere recovery from something bad that he's unaccountably not given any blame for.)

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