August 15, 2016
Jorgina Corio/Facebook
Lake at Beltzville State Park in Carbon County, Pennsylvania.
Authorities say a 38-year-old Camden man was killed and two others were injured in a lightning strike Saturday night at Beltzville State Park in northeastern Pennsylvania.
Officials identified Jose Lopez-Hernandez as the victim fatally electrocuted while swimming in a lake at the park in Carbon County, according to NJ.com. Lopez-Hernandez, of the 3000 block of Grand Avenue in Camden, was accompanied by another 33-year-old man and his two children, a 12-year-old son and five-year-old daughter. The names of the other victims were not released.
At around 7:36 p.m., a park ranger noticed lightning and issued a speaker system alert urging swimmers to get out of the water, said Terry Brady, spokesman for the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources.
Lightning reportedly struck the lake almost instantly, but there were no initial signs that anyone had been hurt. Investigators believe Lopez-Hernandez managed to exit the water after he had been struck. He soon collapsed and became unresponsive in the park's beach area until a ranger arrived to administer an automated external defibrillator and perform CPR.
Lopez-Hernandez was first treated at Gnaden Huetten Memorial Hospital in Lehighton and later transported to Lehigh Valley Hospital Cedar Crest in Salisbury Township. He was pronounced dead at 3:03 a.m.
The two other victims were treated at Palmerton Hospital for symptoms associated with "electrical shock."
Brady said all four swimmers were in water up to their necks at the time of the lightning strike.
An exact cause of death for Lopez-Hernandez is pending an autopsy to be completed Monday by the Lehigh County Coroner's Office. The incident remains under investigation.
