• 1/3 of injuries affect individuals during work.
• 1/3 of injuries affect individuals during recreational or sports activities.
• 1/3 of injuries affect individuals in a diverse situation, including those inside buildings.

Lightning tends to be a nervous system injury and may affect the brain, autonomic nervous system and the peripheral nervous system. When the brain is affected, the person often has difficulty with short-term memory, coding new information and accessing old information, multitasking, distractibility, irritability and personality change.

• Intense headaches, ringing in the ears, dizziness.
• Nausea and vomiting.
• Dermatological symptoms including deep burns or superficial burns.
• Eye injuries including cataracts, macular holes and retinal separation.
• Difficulty sleeping or sleeping excessively at first and then only two or three hours at a time.
• Seizure-like activity several weeks to months after the injury.
• Personality changes due to frontal lobe damage. These include: irritability; anger; inability to express what is wrong with them; inability to recognize things; embarrassment for the inability to carry on a conversation, work at their previous job, or do the activities they used to handle. Many isolate themselves, withdrawing from family, friends and other activities.
• Depression, which may result in suicide or resorting to alcohol and other drugs.
• Fatigue after only a few hours of work.
• Delayed problems including severe pain, especially in the back. This could lead to Sympathetically Mediated Pain Syndrome.
• Decrease libido and impotence.