Last night, after I closed up the store and was heading home, I stopped to watch some of the light show the thunder storms were putting on. It wasn't raining much where I was, but the town just to the south of me was getting pounded. (According to radio reports, there were over 25,000 ground strikes in the Western New York area during last night's storms. That may be just a normal Florida night, but it was a little extreme for us.)
So to stay out of the little rain I was getting, and to have a good view of the southern sky, I stood under the Diesel Pump canopy. Mostly, what I saw was just the clouds lighting up from lightning bolts I couldn't directly see. But every once in a while, I was treated to a spectacular lightning strike.
None of them were within miles of me, but as I stood there I started thinking about a few things. On the one hand, I was under a structure that had to have been engineered to withstand lightning strikes and should be perfectly safe. On the other hand, I was standing under a 30 foot tall metal canopy sitting on top of 20,000 gallons of fuel.
It was late, and I was getting tired, so discretion won out and I went home. But it was still fun to watch.
Posted by GEBIV at June 10, 2005 05:19 PM