PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. — A Pinellas County man is recovering in the hospital after surviving a lightning strike while on the job Monday.
Travis Kurtz’s girlfriend said he was checking on one of his company’s commercial properties when he was hit.
She said, based on his condition and the ground where he was found, they believe the electricity traveled through an underground sprinkler system to get to him.
“Next thing, he remembers is waking up in his tenant’s pizzeria with the EMTs,” Jessica French relayed, explaining that the pizza store owner found Kurtz laying on the ground in the rain some time after he was hit.
She said Kurtz’s heart rate was above 265, and first responders used several different medications to get his body back under control.
What was odd, she said, was the weather. Kurtz does not remember conditions being unsafe. French said he has the flexibility to choose whether to be outside and where on any given day, and he went to that particular property because the weather was nice.
“He’s like, ‘Oh, it’s nicer day. There’s kind of a cooler breeze,’ and before you knew it, bam,” French said.
Kurtz has called the pizza store owner several times to thank him. French said he’s also walking out of the hospital with a new perspective on life.
“I don’t think anyone thinks he’d be alive if he didn’t find him,” she said.
The family has set up a GoFundMe to pay for the medical care Kurtz is receiving and to support French as she takes time off work to care for him.
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