Lightning Strikes Woman Inside Louisiana Supermarket

Shoppers at a Louisiana grocery store got a shock themselves when a woman was apparently struck Monday by lightning in the checkout line.

Houma Fire District Chief Joe Moupon says the woman, whose name was not released but is believed to be OK, was paying for her items about 2:13 p.m. Monday when a flash of lightning during a rain storm hit her inside the store.

‘I’ve never heard of anything like that,” National Weather Service Meteorologist Gavin Phillips said. The lightning most likely was transmitted through the store’s electric system, he added.

The Courier reports the woman was alert as she was quickly taken to the hospital.

The business remained open after the incident.

A foot-wide blackened tile by a register marked the strike.

“I guess it’s just one in a million,” one store employee said.

The odds of being struck by lightning in an average lifetime are about 1 in 6,250, according to the National Weather Service. In the U.S., there were about 60 people killed and 340 injured by lightning in 2008, the most recent year statistics are available.