5/10/09

The Curious Case of Roy Sullivan

Roy Cleveland Sullivan (February 7, 1912 – September 28, 1983) was a U.S. park ranger in Shenandoah National Park in Virginia. Sullivan was hit by lightning on seven different occasions and survived all of them. In his lifetime he gained "Human Lightning Conductor" as a nickname. On September 28, 1983, Sullivan died at age 71, by committing suicide, reportedly distraught over an unrequited love.

According to National Geographic's Flash Facts About Lightning, the odds of being struck in a lifetime is three-thousand to one. If the different events of "being struck by lightning" were statistically independent, the chances of being struck seven times in a lifetime are about one to twenty-two septillion (1:2.2 x 10^24).

(www.wikipedia.org)