Lightning — Caddo, Louisiana

2011-07-04 · near Greenwood, Caddo, Louisiana

Event narrative

A lightning strike touched off a fire that killed an elderly couple at their home in Greenwood, Louisiana. Killed in the fire was Ralph Elliott, 83 and his wife Mary, 83.

Wider weather episode

A large outflow boundary initiated by previous showers and thunderstorms over northern Arkansas during the day Monday spread south into the Four State Region during the late afternoon and evening. This boundary helped with the development of showers and thunderstorms that interacted with other isolated and smaller scale outflow boundaries to produce scattered strong to severe thunderstorms that contained locally heavy rainfall, frequent and continuous lightning strikes, and gusty winds of 30 to near 45 mph and isolated higher gusts. These gusts downed trees and power lines. Daytime temperatures were near the century mark Around nightfall the storms went into a decreasing cycle with loss of the afternoon heating. However, during the evening, remnants of a sea breeze boundary spread north across parts of East Texas and lower Northwest and North Central Louisiana and collided with the south bound boundary, allowing storms to increase in intensity as they moved across parts of Louisiana just prior to midnight.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (32.4300, -93.9700)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 319728. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.