Bob CollinsThe next time you get frustrated because weather prevents your flight from leaving on time, think of this video that was made public today.
It happened on June 22 when Austin Dunn, a 21-year-old airport worker in Fort Myers, was pushing back a Sun Country flight.
Here’s another angle:
An employee at Southwest Florida Int'l Airport suffered 3rd-degree burns & bleeding in the brain when lightning struck a plane near him pic.twitter.com/4i9bu6giNf
— CBS Evening News (@CBSEveningNews) August 2, 2017
He’s spent the last two weeks in the hospital, his father reports on Facebook.
“We knew he wouldn’t give up,” his sister, Autumn, tells a local TV station. “Once we knew he was alive…It was a relief but it was definitely the scariest thing, you don’t expect it … you don’t expect it.”
Workers at the airport are generally told to stay under cover when the facility’s lightning detection system indicates lightning in the area, the Fort Myers News-Press said.
But that doesn’t go for airline workers or, as in Dunn’s case, companies that are hired to provide ground services for airlines.
“That’s the contractor or airline’s authority,” a spokeswoman for the airport authority said. “(Thor Guard) is the system we provide for the good of the airport.”
Sun Country did not respond to a request for information.
