Welcome to the Huntback Country podcast. This is episode number 551.

And in today's episode, we take a deep dive on lightning and lightning safety.

For those of us that hunt the mountains and especially backpack hunt where you're out there,

no matter what conditions come, it's important to know about lightning safety. That's come to mind

for many of us even more in this past fall, as there's been actually a couple of incidents where

hunters have been killed by lightning. And I personally know someone else who is actually

struck and thankfully not fatally killed. The proverbial joke is,

what are the chances? I mean, it's like getting struck by lightning. But then you hear stories and

events happen and it feels like, well, there is a chance. So what do you do? What can you do if you're in

the mountains? We discussed that today with our guest, John, who is a lightning

safety expert. I'll let him share more and explain more about his background and his work

and his introduction. But needless to say, I was incredibly excited to get him on the podcast

with the amount of experience and knowledge that he has in this topic.

If you guys are enjoying the show, it does help us tremendously if you can leave a rating or review in your podcast app.

Hit pause and do that now if you can. We certainly do appreciate it.

Then come right back. Let's dive into this conversation with John.

Well, John, I am excited to have you on the podcast today. I have to say that when this topic of lightning had come up, and it's something that Steve and I have discussed just from our own experience, but we're far from the experts. But when the topic had come up, I was like,

I wonder if there even is such a thing, kind of as a lightning expert. Like, I don't know if that

exists. And as I started looking online at various places and resources, I found you. So I'm glad you're here today to join

us. Well, thank you, Mark. I'm glad to be on your podcast. Can you go ahead and give us an

introduction and background for who you are? Yeah, feel free to keep that as brief or detailed as you'd

like. Sure. I'm a meteorologist and a lightning safety specialist with the

...