COLQUITT COUNTY, Ga. — A south Georgia community is mourning the death of a 9-year-old girl after a storm moved in over the holiday weekend.
The Colquitt County Coroner told Channel 2 Action News that Nicol Mateo Pedro, her 15-year-old sister and their mother were walking along a trail in Moultrie on Friday afternoon when a storm started coming in.
The three went under a wooden shelter on the path to wait for the storm to pass. But as they were waiting, lightning struck a pine tree next to the shelter, and the bolt of electricity traveled into the shelter, hitting the young girl as she was sitting on a bench.
The girl was taken to Colquitt Regional Medical Center, which was just about a block and a half away, where she was pronounced dead in the emergency room.
Pedro’s sister suffered serious burns in the strike. She was airlifted to Augusta Burn Center.
The girl’s mother, and two other people who were near by, were not injured in the strike.
Coroner Verlyn Brock told Channel 2 Action News that in his 12 years as coroner, he’s never had a deadly lightning strike in his community.
If you’d like to send flowers or a sympathy card to the family, you can do so here.
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