One hiker was killed and four others were injured when lightning struck a peak in the Colorado Rockies on Sunday afternoon.
Read more Where are California bargains for renters seeking a house?
The five were at the 14,265-foot summit of Mt. Blue Sky, which can be reached by a short hike from a parking lot, around 1:20 p.m. Sunday, said the sheriff’s office in Clear Creek County.
The person who died was a teenage boy, and two of those injured were members of his family, TV station Denver7 reported.
One of the injured people was airlifted to a hospital, a sheriff’s spokesperson told the Denver Post.
Blue Sky — which before 2023 was known as Mt. Evans — is one of the most accessible of Colorado’s 58 14,000-foot peaks. The parking lot can by reached by a 90-minute drive from Denver, and the summit is a 10-minute hike from there.
The National Lightning Safety Council, which gave the boy’s age as 16, said he is the sixth person to die this year from a lightning strike in the United States. In the previous nine years, the average U.S. toll was 17 lightning deaths, most of them in the summer.
Read more Major delays greet BART commuters in Contra Costa County
—
CALIFORNIA DEATHS
Since 2006, California has recorded nine deaths by lightning, according to the National Lightning Safety Council.
2009: Tina Marie Bond, 40, walking to a bus in Fontana (San Bernardino County); MaryAnn Heald, 70, in her yard in Portola (Plumas County).
2012: Frank Baeta, 71, camping in Nevada County
2013: Christine Adrian, 66, camping near Dardanelle (Tuolumne County)
2014: Nick Fagnano, 20, swimming at Venice Beach
2015: Stephen Ermigarat, 62, checking on his mother’s Bakersfield house during a storm
2020: Eugene Arao, 47, jetskiing at Stampede Reservoir, north of Truckee
2021: Nicholas Torchia, 37, backpacking on the John Muir Trail near Florence Lake, in Fresno County
2022: Antonia Mendoza Chavez, 52, walking her dogs on a trail near the San Gabriel River in Pico Rivera. The pets died, too.
About the Author
