Man thought dead after lightning strike regains pulse, consciousness
INDIANAPOLIS -- Authorities say a school police officer and a rescue crew revived a man after a lightning strike left him without a pulse.
Indianapolis Fire Department Battalion Chief Rita Reith says the man was among three contractors paving a parking lot at Park Tudor School on the north side of Indianapolis who sought shelter from a storm under a tree at about 3 p.m. Tuesday.
She says a lightning strike knocked all three men to the ground, and the one nearest the strike went into cardiac arrest.
CBS Indianapolis affiliate WTTV cites police in saying the man appeared to have lost his life.
But Reith says school Officer William Hagy began CPR and shocked him once with an external defibrillator, rescue crews shocked him twice more and the man regained a pulse 12 minutes after their arrival.
Reith says all three men were hospitalized. Their names weren't released.
The man whose pulse was restored was awake and talking to doctors, WTTV says, citing fire officials. The other two workers had minor injuries, the station says.
Cathy Chapelle, Park Tudor's Director of Strategic Communications, told WTTV no school activities were going on at the time of the lightning strike.
