Pollyana

Man dies after lightning strikes family, including newborn and toddler, on Gold Coast - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Sometimes you just want to say WHY!
Family went to vote, horrendous storm hit the gold coast, they took shelter in the park with their two kids, 18 months old and 12 weeks old. Lightning struck the place they took shelter and the father is now dead.

Many of us have issues and krap going on in our lives but this really makes you think......

That poor family

Charismatic

Their lives are changed in a flash.

Too soon?

Pollyana

I get you

Its the way emergency services people (like me) cope.

Makes you think though.....

Charismatic

Luckily you didn't post it in The Barbie section of the forum or we'd look really insensitive.

There are many things I do for personal safety...looking both ways before crossing, always wearing a seatbelt and never commenting on my partners peculiar diets but I won't be worrying too much about lightening strikes because the probability is so low.

Pollyana

Actually a lot of the Barbie posters either work in emergency services at some level or have partners who do/have in the past. Thats why I know I can post things like that in here

Charismatic

Just to be clear, as I’ve lived an insulated life, lightening isn’t transmissible is it? Or is it like chicken pox? They do say lightning never strikes twice.

irishbloo

What a terrible tragedy.Poor family.I hope the rest of the family recovers well.

irishbloo

Too soon,but that's me.

BadgeIsBack

Black humour is readily understood, I reckon, but you are right, it is particularly prevalent in emergency services and the Armed Forces or any close-knit unit which has to deal with the unpleasant.

Charismatic

...customer service then.

Life is inherently unfair, harsh and inconsequential by nature. We can't pretend that every terrible that happens can be explained in the framework of a just-world hypothesis. I think Pope once write that "True wit is nature to advantage dressed, what is often thought but never so well expressed" and I can't help but agree. Our helplessness and futility of our efforts should be a source of great amusement, it lets us transcend an immediate situation and share some perspective on an event. We can reach out to each other with humor in a way that carries extreme sincerity and understanding because a joke is just a previously concealed truth...even a very painful truth wrapped in that diffusive device.

Far from stepping back from humor and regarding it as inappropriate we should embrace it to help each other cope with stress, fear and grief. Humor can give us the resilience and fortitude to carry on. Play up! Play up! and Play the game!

carolinephillips

Wrong. Lightning strikes randomly and can certainly strike the same place or person twice. Golf courses seem to be a favourite, as do trees. When I was little I was in a park, and there was a downpour, so we went under a tree to shelter. Needless to say it was a mistake as the lightning struck the tree and boiled the sap off. Terrifying for a 5 year old. I never shelter under trees now. Best thing to do is to get as flat on the ground as possible.

Bix

+1

moneypenny20

It can never be 'too soon'. However I come from a position of being surrounded by Emergency Services personnel and a father who didn't appear to have a filter.

cresta57

I doubt they'll be playing Lou Christie at the funeral

moneypenny20

Either showing your age or your dodgy taste in music.

Gutted I immediately knew what you were talking about.