My lightning miracle
Published: November 21, 2006
TERESA Bradford used to love watching electrical storms but she will stay indoors in future after a lightning strike just centimetres from her body left her dazed and convulsing. [Almost History: Close Calls, Plan B’s, and Twists of Fate in America’s Past]
“I know I’m lucky to be here today. God wasn’t ready for me yet and I’m pretty happy about that,” said the Carrara woman as she recovered at home yesterday from her ordeal at the height of the severe electrical storm that swept across the Gold Coast on Wednesday afternoon.
Mrs Bradford had been feeling unwell at work at a Helensvale call centre on Wednesday and was sent home.
“I remember it was about 3.30pm when the storm was just hitting us in Carrara and I realised that I had left the car windows open and I dashed outside,” she said.
“Then I must have noticed the front gates were open and my foxie Max had got out so I went down the front and I was near a power pole, and that’s all I remember.
“My neighbours told me that they saw the lightning strike the ground about 12cm from me and the next thing I was on the ground having convulsions.
“They carried me under the car port and it was about an hour later that I remembered people around me telling me I would be all right.”
Her children Louise, 7, and Jack, 6, arrived home from school to find a small crowd gathered around their mum at their Jadestone Court home.
“They were hysterical and people were asking me the names of close friends and I couldn’t remember who they were,” she said.
While Mrs Bradford was being rushed to hospital by ambulance, a worried Mark, her husband of three weeks and partner of nine years, was also racing to the hospital after being told the news.
“I expected the doctors would be taking me into a room to tell me the bad news and I was trying to work out how I would tell the kids, because I didn’t expect her to have survived being struck by lightning,” he said.
“I went straight into emergency and I was really pleased to see her lying there alive and I can’t even remember what we said to each other.
“We are going on a honeymoon cruise shortly with the kids, and it will be even more special now.
“I was given Thursday off work, so I’ve already been out and bought the Lotto tickets. You have to after something like this.”
Yesterday Mrs Bradford was stretched out on her couch with a bandage around her head covering the large gash she suffered when she hit the ground.
“My head hurts, I’ve got a lot of aches and pains and my legs feel like I’ve been in a marathon, but the doctors say that’s normal from the convulsions,” she said.
“But I’m not having any special thoughts. I’m not doing the John Travolta things and I’m not bending spoons or anything,” she said, referring to the 1996 Travolta movie Phenomenon about an ordinary man who thought he had been struck by lightning and become super-intelligent as a result.
“But in future if there is a storm, I’ll be staying inside.”
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