Dirtbag Dispatches: One Summit, Five People, And Two Lightning Bolts

The first lightning bolt knocked Bruce Weiner senseless, and left him without feeling in his legs. The second one hit him so hard, his spirit seemed to leave his body.

- Derek Cheng

" "There was this incredible pressure wave, and when the wave ended, I was definitely looking down at my body from outside of my body. And I knew that if I left my body completely, I knew that that was death."

"It wasn’t like I had control over it. If this is the time, this is the time. I didn’t wanna die, and I didn’t know if I was going to, but I think I was very close to death at that moment.”

Weiner, an engineer from Massachusetts, was one of five people inside a small rock enclosure on the summit of Half Dome, in Yosemite National Park. It was summer, 1985. He was in his early 20s and it was his first experience in the outdoors.

Just before the storm struck, he had been enthralled in the delightful delirium of reaching the summit after a 13km hike with almost 1500m of elevation gain through one of the world's most scenic wonders.

Weiner and his best friend Bob Frith made their final push as the summit of Half Dome became engulfed in a heavy thunderstorm. Frith's friends Adrian Esteban and Tom Rice, who had summited Half Dome several times over the years, had told them that there was a partially covered rock enclosure on the summit that would provide safe refuge in stormy weather, so they forged ahead.

By the time they reached the enclosure, they were cramping, dehydrated, and utterly exhausted. But they were overwhelmed with what they had achieved, and by the sheer beauty of the place. That all changed in an instant when the lightning hit. Weiner's initial impression was that Esteban's propane stove, which he had been using to make tea, had exploded. But then he realised he couldn't feel his legs.