Al-
Sorry to read about this. Glad to know no one was hurt - sounds really scary. Check back in with us when you can.

- Pat

So sorry. Makes a real mess. Had it happen to me a few years ago. You have probably lost more than you at first think. For years after my refrigerator and furnace switches gave problems until replaced. think it kind of burned the contacts. Be sure to list all things when you file insurance.
KennyP
PS: Did it help to ripen the tomatoes or curl their leaves?

Thanks, Pat. ;o)

KP - Oh - you mean from all that extra N that lightning puts into the air? Lol

Al

Really sorry to hear Al, and glad that no one got hurt. Take care of yourself!

Dear talpa/AL

Sorry to hear about your loss. My thoughts and prayers are with you. I hope you have backups of your data.

LC

Al, I'm so sorry to hear about your lightening strike. Glad that no one was injured and the house didn't burn. We use to have an electronic business and did estimates on a lot of lightening strike damage for our customers as well as estimates on damages due to power outage surges when the power was restored. Argued and won with our local REMC over one poor fellow that had losses due to surges several times and never had asked the REMC to replace his losses. Make sure you test every single thing you have that is electically operated. That includes all major appliances and small appliances like toasters, phones, exercise equipment, etc., that might have been plugged in. Good luck and I hope you are back to whole soon.

Sorry to hear about that Al, sux.

Al,
We are all glad no one was hurt. A similar thing happened in my house about a year ago. Fried the circuit boards in both garage door openers, a refrigerator, router, security system, sub-woofer. Everything is now plugged in to surge suppressors along with we now have a whole house surge suppressor as well. You might want to contemplate such a thing if you have frequent thunderstorms :-)
Ward

So sorry Al. glad no one was hurt. Had same thing happen to me when I lived in south Florida. I was sitting on the couch. Sounded like someone tossed a m-80 under me. Fried some stuff. The strangest thing was it rung the doorbell! And it was battery operated. The insurance adjuster told me he had just come from a home that got hit. The bolt caused the re-rod in the cement to pop straight up in the garage. All the tires were flat on the car! filix.

Glad no one was hurt. The weather does get strange every single year. I moved my current home 4 years ago, I got a flooded basement 3 years ago. We had 120mm rain in just one hour, this never happened before. Our of my co-worker's home was hit by the lighting as well. It scared the hell out of him. He checked everything and found nothing damaged at first, except a year later, he found he couldn't turn off the water main, the valve melted somehow.

Lightning is rare for us and when I read of the consequences I am glad. Sorry for you Al.

Well, the puter was a priority & that's all set. None of the data was lost, but I do back it up regularly anyway, so I wouldn't have lost much. Have only needed the air conditioner ONE darn day this year so far, and that was a month ago; but wouldn't you know it - today's to be 90* and humid. Lol Mr Murphy (Murphy's Law) living with me, eh? No charge from the cable company to replace the cable boxes. Next priority is the wiring & central air conditioner.

Waiting on the insurance adjuster now, but I don't anticipate any difficulty there, as my business is tight with the ins. co. and we've always watched out for their customers who were trying to cheat them (too long of a story).

For those of you who have dealt with lightning strikes: Isn't it WEIRD!? It does SUCH strange things! ;o) Thanks for the thoughts, guys. ;o)

Al

Dang! Gonna be installing a lighting rod now!.. LoL

Had a some close ones but never a direct hit. Had a transformer on the pole infront of the house explode! Shook the house an sounded like a stick of TNT, but no damage.

Hope all the replacements an repairs go smoothly an in a timely fashion for you!

Later, Rob

Al, that's scary!! Sheesh...

It is certainly a crazy weather year!

I am so glad you are ok....Hope everything works out for you big time....

I CANNOT believe what the adjuster told me. I was thinking it might end up being a $1,000-2,000 claim after all was said & done, and I'd end up squabbling about the costs, but he took pictures of ovens, refrigerators, microwaves, TVs, surround sound equip, lots of stereo equipment, sewing machine, boom boxes, treadmill, freezer, air compressor ...., basically anything that was plugged in except lamps, and said "If you make a list, we'll replace it with new items of equal quality ..... plus do the repairs on the wiring, air conditioning ...... Then, he pressed me to take advantage of the offer, because if I didn't, I'd have trouble down the road trying to get the insurance to spring for anything that went bad in the immediate future. "If you come to me a month from now & say your TV took a dump & you want it replaced, I'm going to remind you of our conversation today and ask why you didn't take advantage of our offer and get it replaced. Now you have to show me that the lightning caused the problem." The guy was sooo happy to be doing it, too - like Santa handing out presents! I seriously considered asking him if he was on drugs. Lolol.

I'm still nearly dumbstruck!

Al

SO GOOD THINGS HAPPEN TO GOOD PEOPLE!:-).....

sorry to hear you got struck, but glad that the ins. is treating you right that's pretty rare.
1,000,000 volts can sure fry things quick can't they.
I've opened electronics hit by lighting and the metal traces on the PCB will be burned right off the board.
Your Friend,
Angel

GOOD THINGS ... GOOD PEOPLE!!?? C'MON, MAN! I GOT HIT BY LIGHTNING FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!!! Lolol (teasing)

Thanks, Angel.

Al

Hahhhhah...That is a good one..lol

Kissed by lightning! ;)
Glad you made it, Al, and I'm glad it hasn't dampened your mood!

Josh

I'll let you know how it all shakes out after it's about over. It'll be a pain, but we've been here for over 30 years, and some of the appliances haven't been replaced. A number of them are getting close to the end of their serviceable life. It'll be nice to get them replaced. For now, I'm just taking it in stride - it's easy to just be grateful for and focused on the fact that no one was hurt and there wasn't a fire.

Al

Hey Al, very sorry to read about your lightning strike. Man I bet that was scary!! I'm very glad that no one was injured and that the house didn't burn down. You had luck on your side for sure, hard as that may be to believe.

Anyway, please keep us posted on how this turns out.

Take care,

Dave

Hi Al,

Just now read this post! Sorry for the damages. I hope everything works out for the best...sounds like it should? We're all pulling for you. Glad no one was hurt. That happened to us about 7 -8 yrs ago, but not nearly as bad as yours. Keep us posted!

Al,

Sorry to hear about the lightning--glad no one was hurt and there wasn't a fire.

When I read your first post, I thought I'd log on and offer you my extra camping equipment--camp stove, lanterns--and an old computer. By the time I got to the end, it seems you'll be inviting us over to watch the big screen with surround sound.

Hope everything works out for you.

red_chucks

Al, at least you weren't hit by a tornado which is probably as likely as getting hit by lightning. I saw a lightning bolt hit in an empty yard across the street from me in July of 2006 while surfing the net. It immediately fried my computer's motherboard that I was on, caused one of my Linux servers to go bonkers (it recovered after reboot), and fried every network card in the building as well as all the CO detectors and a couple of answering machines. It did havoc to all my neighbors as well. My main server, brandylion.com, a PII 333MHz, the little server that could, kept running like nothing happened (it is currently up for 366 days knock on wood).

I don't have insurance for stuff like that. My insurance is for catastrophic events like if my whole place burns down or severely burnt. The problem with insurance is that if you nickle and dime them (and I don't mean to imply your loss was nickles or dimes), they keep track of that and they'll collect their nut in the long run by increasing your premiums over the next bunch of years. All insurance companies are hooked into the same database that keeps track of your claims so you can't really go to a different provider. And they can be real bastards when it comes time to pay up like you experienced. I don't want to deal with that so I keep a high deductable and just pay out of my pocket for the little things that happen.

If you want real insurance for stuff like this, invest in a UPS to protect the expensive stuff like flat screen TVs and perhaps your PCs. UPSs are pretty cheap nowadays and I doubt a lightning strike would get through one of those but I could be wrong.

When will the new appliances be arriving? I'll plan my trip up north around then... =D Glad the family is ok but how about the plants?

GG

Nance - I really didn't think it was all that bad until the adjuster started telling me how bad it was. It's HIS suggestion that we replace all this stuff - not mine. ;o)

RC - I've got all the equipment I need to rough-it in the back country, but it doesn't look like I'll be needing it this time. Thanks.

Mea - I'm just glad that I had a 'full replacement cost' rider on my home owner's policy. I have a high deductible, but as I understand the adjuster, I list EVERYTHING that was hardwired or plugged in, and those things I decide not to replace can be used as a credit against the deductible and as a credit toward any upgrades I might like to make. My carrier is Auto owners & so far they've been wonderful.

GG - Don't know when the new stuff will be coming in. Gotta go shopping, but for now, everything is patched back together so it works --- except for one TV, the central air, and some other minor electronic stuff. I hope you make it up this way. I'll set aside some time if you make it up/over.

Later, guys.

Al

BTW, UPS's do not protect against that kind of lightning strike. They do however have their own warranty that will replace the items that were connected to them at the time of the surge. Just an 'extra' insurance policy. Always a good thing to have...

Shannon

"BTW, UPS's do not protect against that kind of lightning strike. They do however have their own warranty that will replace the items that were connected to them at the time of the surge. Just an 'extra' insurance policy. Always a good thing to have... " That's right

Here is a link that might be useful: ac

Al, how did everything turn out from then?

I was thinking about this the other day, during my feirce storm..

Hope you are having a splendid summer from Mom and I..

Mike..:-):-)

Everything went just fine. I actually still have LOTS of appliances still in boxes because the old ones are still working just fine. The insurance company picked up a large screen TV, an air compressor, and some older stereo equipment, along with 1 refrigerator, 1 range, and a freezer. All the rest of the appliances, including boom boxes, cameras on docks, and anything that was plugged in, except lamps, was replaced - practically at the insistence of the adjuster. I would have turned in a claim of less than $1,000, but it ended up being about $60,000 after all was over. Everything electrical in the house is new, including the central air, boiler parts other than the boiler proper (we have HW heat).

Auto Owners was my carrier, and I have to say they went so far beyond what I ever expected ...... so all is well, Mike. Thanks.

Summer started early here. We've had some REALLY warm days, for MI, and our last frost was around May 7, where last year we had several frosts all through May, with several at intervals between the 15th (our supposed last frost day), right up until the two we had Mem Day weekend.

Give your mom a hug for me, please? ;o)

Al

How did I miss this thread? I'm glad I did because I got to read the whole saga at one time! I'm also glad everyone was safe!! Very happy that you got such a nice settlement from your adjuster! Woot!! Congrats on the new appliances! Now you are going to have to repaint the whole house, get new flooring, so it will all be new!! I can hear it now, the new appliances speak to each other at night, "How did we get stuck in such a dump?" :-)

Just kidding, Al! Congrats!
Suzi

Your welcome Al..

We are happy everything is working out well for you..

Let's hope this never happens again...It has been said that lightning never strikes twice in the same place..

We are always thinking of you and thank you for all you have done here..

Us....

Mike

Yikes, terrible thing to go through, but glad no one was hurt. And I'm really glad you're getting your a/c unit replaced, I was in Michigan (Lansing) for a wedding this time last year and we almost melted from the brutal heat.

Fingers crossed you don't have any more electrical storms! :)

My mom had something similar. The electrical to the house was loose (because of the electrical company cutting down trees in the yard) It shorted one day and caused a surge. Throughout the house there were loud pops of various electrical equipement being shocked to death. The insurance company payed to have everything replaced that was plugged in except the fridge. My mom unplugged that as soon as the TV near the kitchen went pow. Im still shaking my head at her for that one. Who doesnt want a new fridge? LOL

Precious