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| Football field |
A medical student was killed after being struck by lightning in the
middle of a football match. Alexey Simonov, 18, died at the scene after a
strike on metal goalposts as players crowded in the penalty area during a match
in the Altai region of Russia. He was one of seven players to be hit by the lightning . Fellow students rushed to help him seeing
how the lightning had burned his stubble and left his hair standing on end.
His friend Nikita Esin, who was injured by lightning, said: "I ran
to Alexei. He had been standing near the goalposts."I was the first to ran
up to him. "At that moment, he still had a pulse. "But the first
thing that caught my eye was that his stubble was charred and his hair stood on
end." The teenager died moments later.
The referee had failed
to halt the game when a storm hit early in the second half of a game between
Rubtsovsky Medical College and the local branch of Altai State University.
Another player said: "Four guys were on the ground. There was
blood. We are future doctors and we realised immediately that Lesha (Alexey)
had died."I called to the ambulance. "I said: 'A man has been killed
by lightning!'. They did not believe me and replied: 'Don't make jokes like
that.'"
An ambulance arrived after 15 minutes but could not reach the deluged
pitch. The players carried the wounded - and the dead player - to the paramedic
vehicles.
Amid the rush to get the wounded to hospital, the body of the dead
lightning strike teenager was left lying in the road. Another player Vitaly
Burmitskih, also injured by the lightning, said: "We played the first
half, then there was a break."At the start of the second half the rain
began. The game was not stopped. "There was a thunderstorm and lightning.
And everyone near the goalposts fell to the ground."Three students were detained in hospital with burns. They are in a
"stable" condition, three more were discharged.(ASP)