What a strange change of weather. The forecast this morning was still full sun and then the forecast quickly changed to Thunderstorm Warning. Early hikers must have been fooled to go out believing it would be a similar day as the whole week has been. I was standing ready to go to the beach when I heard the thunder and re-checked the weather..
It's never a good idea to go hiking in summer: the risk of heatstroke and being struck by lightning,and flash floods too
When I lived in HK I went swimming in summer and hiking in winter
Lightning usually strikes higher ground and thunderstorms can come out of nowhere
It's a tragedy though
Does the relevant Hong Kong authority explain the dangers of thunderstorms to hikers?
If you go to e.g. Grand Canyon, you’ll see signs “do not hike in thunderstorm”
Seems odd, eh? Four folks hiking, one 'suspectedly' struck by a lightning bolt and the 3 others did not notice. Well, to be fair, perhaps the bolt was a small one although an average lightning bolt releases about 1 million volts of electricity.
Rather like the man holding the smoking gun and is pronounced by the media to be the 'alleged' perpetrator.
IMO, better this way than run-over by a taxi while biking with your kids.
It wasn't forecast well ahead of time and it was an odd storm, lots of thunder with no rain, suddenly tons of rain +wind for short period, then back to lots of thunder with light rain. Lightning strikes were difficult to see but there was a huge number of strikes (relative to size and duration):
Many people hike throughout the year in HK - You forgot to warn them about covid, you might catch that on the trail and die too.
We get the clearest vis in summer and less busy trails.
But if you can't take the heat, stay out of the kitchen. Thankfully chefs know better though.