‘Felt pins and needles’: Alabama woman speaks out after being struck by lightning

RUSSELLVILLE, Ala. (WHNT) — A 19-year-old woman spoke out two days after being struck by lightning while on her phone.

Scrolling on Instagram turned into the unexpected for Lisa Henderson on Sunday night as storms passed through Russellville.

“I heard the lightning strike, and then I heard a loud pop, and all I heard was ringing in my ear,” Henderson said.

Henderson said she was holding her phone, which was plugged into a charger on an extension cord, when the lightning struck.

“I felt like stinging and stuff from my fingers to here, feels like I stuck a fork in a light socket,” Henderson said. “After that, I couldn’t comprehend things, and I started crying for five minutes.”

Henderson said she threw her phone across the room the moment she felt the shock waves.

“Luckily, I thought to throw my phone,” Henderson said. “If I would’ve kept it, I could’ve been electrocuted even more than I was.”

Henderson said that she then remembers small glimpses of the ambulance ride.

“I tried telling them my name. I had trouble with that,” Henderson said. “I tried telling them my age. I almost said 18, but I’m 19, so it took me a minute to process my age.”

When she got to the hospital, Henderson told News 19 that doctors told her she was lucky the shock did not get close to her heart.

According to the National Lightning Safety Council, the odds of being struck by lightning in a year are 1 out of 1,600,000. Henderson said she cannot believe it happened to her.

“It’s an uncommon thing to get electrocuted by something like that,” Henderson said.

Henderson was sent home from the hospital Monday. She said she is a little sore around her right wrist, right arm and her chest area but grateful to be alive.