STORM AT CAMBRIDGE

Waikato Times, Volume 94, Issue 14771, 10 October 1921, Page 5

STORM AT CAMBRIDGE

STRUCK BY LIGHTNING (Special to Times). CAMBRIDGE, Monday. An exceptionally heavy thunderstorm passed over Cambridge on Saturday. At Leamington, it is reported, a young man named Robert Waite was driving home in a waggon loaded with manure covered by a tarpaulin from Cambridg'e. Waite was in the vicinity of the Leamington factory, when a particularly heavy, clap of thunder occurred. His horses took fright and bolted, and when eventually pulled in, Waite discovered that the tarpaulin had been well scorched by lightning about a yard behind where he was seated. Later it was discovered that the electric pole just opposite Hie factory was split from top to bottom, in a zig-zag course, a large strip of the timber being splintered. The lightning, after striking this, evidently ran along a fence. Waite certainly had a close call.

A bull was knocked over in an adjoining paddock, and was afterwards peculiar in its antics. At least ten Leamington residents were without electric light on Saturday night, due to the lightning.

At Mr W. Morse’s residence the fuses in the main switch and throughout the house were blown out, all the porcelain attachments being blown to atoms. The main switch was left >n a blackened state and the cups outside the house were also blown out. Similar occurrences are reported from Messrs R. Hunter's store and C. Jarrett’s.

A boy is also reported to have been knocked off a bicycle.