EAGLE MOUNTAIN, Utah — A family in Eagle Mountain was in for a shock after their home caught fire from a lightning strike. The home was safely evacuated and the fire was contained to the attic before being extinguished.
Scott Chatwin and his son were playing Minecraft Wednesday night around 8:40 p.m. when lightning struck their roof, shaking the whole house.
“Really, it was my neighbor standing out and looking at our roof that I was like, ‘Oh, that might have struck us,’” he said.
The attic caught on fire but thankfully, crews were able to extinguish it quickly and the family made it out safely.
The Chatwin family in Eagle Mountain spent all day Thursday cleaning and packing what they could afterward.
“It’s a catastrophe. Insulation, water, and Sheetrock all over the place,” said Scott Chatwin.
The attic caught on fire but thankfully, crews were able to extinguish it quickly and the family made it out safely.
“I know a lot of people have similar experiences and people get hurt so I just feel really blessed,” said Chatwin.
Chelsea Wells knows the feeling.
“It sounded like someone pummeled into me going like 150 [mph],” she said.
Wells was driving through Nevada on her way to Salt Lake City to perform at the Utah Scottish Festival this weekend. Lightning hit her car on the front driver’s side.
“Like a foot above the gas tank. It was super scary,” she said. “A lot of people told me, ‘Wow, you’re lucky to be alive!' And I was like, ‘I know!’”
Only two bullet-sized holes and some smokey smudge marks are to show for the millions of volts that traveled through her RAV4.
“Not everybody gets struck by lightning, but some of us can come out of it still walking,” she said. “That was a good feeling.”
Most cars are safe from lightning. According to the National Weather Service, it’s actually the metal roof and metal sides that protect you, not the rubber tires.
Wells is part of a female bagpipe group that will be releasing a cover of AC/DC’s ‘Thunderstruck’ in the next few weeks. The cover was recorded before her car was lightning struck.
