Five people died and over 150 were injured after powerful thunderstorms struck Poland’s Tatra Mountains. Thursday began with clear skies before a sudden afternoon thunderstorm in the mountain range surprised the tourists.
Lightning struck a metal cross, surrounded by a metal chain, on the Giewont peak at an altitude of 1,894 meters (6,214 feet), and then hit a group of 25 tourists. It prompted the head of an emergency services team to mark the event to a terrorist attack.
Four people, including two children, were killed in Poland and a Czech tourist was killed by the same storm in neighboring Slovakia.
Some 150 people were treated for burns, fractures, and heart problems, 34 of whom remain in hospital as of Friday afternoon. Three people are missing.
Jan Krzysztof, head of the TOPR Tatra volunteer search and rescue service said, that this is a situation that can be compared to a terrorist attack, because a large group of people has been hit. Many people, including children were burnt, with broken legs, wounds all over their bodies.
Krzysztof added that the unprecedented rescue operation involved five helicopters and “went beyond” any scenario his team has ever encountered.
The Tatras are the highest mountains in Poland, and Thursday’s lightning storm was the region’s worst since August 1937 when lightning strikes killed four people on the Giewont peak.
RT. com / ABC Flash Point News 2019.
