A California father and his two young children have lived to tell the tale after they were all struck by lightning during a backpacking trip.
Chris Lovera, 12-year-old Aidan and nine-year-old Nadia were at Jennie Lake in the Sequoia National Forest on September 5 huddling under a tree as a storm swept through.
Lovera, 51, from Pacific Grove, had just started recording on his video camera when a bolt of lightning suddenly came down.
Chris Lovera (center), 12-year-old Aidan (right) and nine-year-old Nadia (left), from Pacific Grove, California, have lived to tell the tale after they were all struck by lightning during a backpacking trip on September 5
The family was huddling under a tree at Jennie Lake in the Sequoia National Forest as a storm swept through. Lovera, 51, had just started recording on his video camera when a sudden bolt of lightning came down
Lovera (pictured) suffered first- and second-degree burns on sections of his upper right back, arm pit and down his right arm
Aidan (left) has suffered partial hearing loss after his ear drum was blown out. Nadia (right) came out the best physically, with burns on the back of her right arm and on her upper thighs
The bolt of electricity hit the tree before striking the father and kids, knocking them all unconscious.
‘After that point it was each of us waking up to a different scene,’ Lovera told CBS San Francisco.
Aidan and Nadia awoke first, but their father was still knocked out.
‘I thought he was dead ’cause I was just screaming at him and I couldn’t see him breathing or moving,’ Aiden said.
It was enough to paralyze Lovera for a few hours, burning his clothes and even fusing them to parts of his body.
Lovera suffered first- and second-degree burns on sections of his upper right back, arm pit and down his right arm with the burns resembling the fractal pattern of a lightning strike.
Lovera (pictured) was paralyzed for a few hours after the strike and is suffering from partial hearing loss
A rescue helicopter flew them out. Lovera (pictured) said that one of the rescuers, Nick Barton, who witnessed the event, told him it looked as if the family had been ‘blown up’
Lovera said the strike burned through a great deal of his clothing (pictured) and even fused parts of it to his body
A rescue helicopter flew them out. Lovera said that one of the rescuers, Nick Barton, who witnessed the event, told him it looked as if the family had been ‘blown up’.
Their burns were healing but Aidan and his dad were still suffering from hearing loss after rupturing their ear drums.
Nadia came out the best physically, with burns on the back of her right arm and on her upper thighs, although she also suffered partial paralysis.
Of the three, Chris suffered the worst of the injuries.
Both of Lovera’s kids (from left to right: Aidan, Lovera and Nadia) are now back in school, although both are dealing with the added challenges of balancing work and recovery
Although Lovera (center with Aidan, left, and Nadia, right) hopes to return to work soon, he says he is grateful that he and his family were able to walk away from the incident alive. He even now wears a ‘Lucky Strike’ shirt in honor of the event
Both of Lovera’s kids are now back in school, although both are dealing with the added challenges of balancing work and recovery.
Although he hopes to return to work soon, he says he is grateful that he and his family were able to walk away from the incident alive.
He even now wears a ‘Lucky Strike’ shirt in honor of the event.
‘Really, what I come away with is just the gratitude I have for this set of people who were so selfless and willing to go out in this storm – it was still lightning and raining, and they went out into this and helped us selflessly,’ Lovera told The Mercury News.
‘And it’s just been overwhelming in a good way to see so many people in our community be willing to give. People are innately good at heart.’