In case ya'll didn't know, my profession is in the petroleum fuel industry and I drive a double tanker semi, delivering gas, diesel, heating oil, and ethanol in the Seattle-Tacoma metro areas. As a truck driver, I've seen just about everthing possible on the road. But last week I had the craziest thing happen, I was struck by lightening!!!
The day shift driver before me had a load of ethanol (denatured alcohol) on the truck/trailer which was now empty and full of alcohol and benzine vapors. I was just coming into downtown Seattle and changing lanes to exit for the West Seattle Bridge to jump over to Harbor Island in the middle of a hail storm, when I hear a loud *CLAP*! My entire vision goes white and I feel a instant tingling vibration go through my entire body! My first thought was, "Oh crap, I just died". I let off the gas, kept the rig straight, and my vision returned. All my gauges were at zero, the engine died, and all my lights were off. I was now coasting down to around 40 mph. Traffic around me split like Moses parting the Red Sea. The hair on my arms and top of my head were standing straight up like in the cartoons! My cell phone was dead and so was our company's nextel radio. I turned to coast for the shoulder and saw my trailer tank in the mirror had steam coming off the sides!!!
Turned the key off and back on and it fired right back up like nothing happened. All gauges went back to normal. Reset the Nextel and my cell phone successfully.
Now I was really lucky, here's why: I was not grounded. When I was struck, the current traveled around the sides of my tanks and grounded across the water on the sides of my tires. If by chance I had a snow chain loose and dragging, that charge would have gone through the truck, zapping me, and igniting the ethanol vapors, and sending me to the moon!!!
Scary stuff, I'm glad I'm alive, thought I'd share it with ya'll!!!
Sean Kelly