Jagatsinghpur: As many as 19 lives have been lost and hundreds others have been injured in lightning strikes starting 2016-17 monsoon season in Jagatsinghpur district, shows data from local administration.
According to the figures available with the district emergency office, eight people have lost their lives to lightning in 2016-17. In 2017-18 and 2018-19, the strikes claimed seven and three lives respectively. This year, one death has been reported already.
The latest incident occurred Thursday when lightning struck a girl student, leaving her dead on the spot. Two others were injured in the incident. The injured are undergoing treatment at a government hospital.
This victim has been identified as Sujata Bhoi, daughter of Subal Bhoi of Naranpur village under Rambhadeipur panchayat in Jagatsinghpur police limits. She was a class-IX student. In the same incident, Sudhir Bhoi’s son Balaram and Basant Bhoi’s son Biswaranjan also suffered burn injuries.
These students had taken refuge in a village club house when the lightning struck. “If we are not safe in houses, what else can be done to avoid it,” said a village elder, adding that, “the nature is being more violent towards us these days.”
“There was a time when we used to work in open fields even when it rained heavily. We would even go from one village to another despite heavy downpour. We never faced such frequent cases of lightning as they are now. We are now afraid of going out of our houses,” he observed.
According to a retired weather expert here, the lightning cases are increasing these days because of climate change and the changes marked in monsoon arrival. And we, the human beings are more or less responsible for this. Population is increasing and trees are being sacrificed on the altar of development. However, new trees are not being planted to replenish the lost,” he said.
“People spend lakhs of rupees in getting their buildings constructed. But few people have proper earthing systems to ground lightnings. This is the reason why most houses do not survive such strikes,” he pointed out.
Besides, due to lack of awareness and not paying heed to the alerts of the weather department, the numbers of lightning cases continue to increase, he said.
It may be mentioned here that lightning strikes claimed 1, 656 lives in the state in the last four years which accounts for 27 percent of total natural calamities deaths. While 399 people died in the year 2015-16, 397 died in 2016-17, 460 in 2017-18 and 400 people died in the year 2018-19.
PNN