Lightning Kill 9-Year-Old Boy, Injure Several Others At Minesota Beach

                                        

Curled from CBS news reports

A 9-year-old Wisconsin boy died from a lightning strike, one of eight boaters who were trying to seek shelter at a Lake Superior beach, Minnesota authorities said Sunday.

Luke Voigt, 9, of Iron River, Wis., was one of eight family members and friends who were on a 26-foot sailboat that took refuge about 5:30 p.m. Saturday from a rapidly approaching thunderstorm near the Duluth-Superior harbor, the St. Louis County Sheriff's Office said in a news release.

According to the Duluth News Tribune the boaters were on the beach, in the water or still on the boat when a lightning bolt struck.


One victim was able to call 911.

"Everyone was blown off their feet. It was like a grenade went off, and there was a blinding flash of white light," the News Tribune quoted Sgt. Wade Rasch, an investigator for the St. Louis County Sheriff's Office as saying, recalling the words of the boat's captain.

Law enforcement and rescue agencies rushed by boat and ATV to the site on the end of Minnesota Point, near the Superior Entry to the Duluth-Superior harbor, about two miles from the nearest road to Duluth.

Luke was flown to a hospital in Duluth, where he was pronounced dead. Four others were taken to Duluth hospitals with what authorities described as severe but not life-threatening injuries.