Lightning in Gregg County, Texas

A 53 year old man was struck and killed by lightning on Cox Lane. Victim was located approximately 25 feet from a large tree that was struck by lightning.

Scattered severe thunderstorms developed across portions of East Texas during the mid/late afternoon hours of the 27th, producing a large swath of tree, power line, and structural damage. These storms developed well ahead of a cold front that extended from southern and eastern Oklahoma, into central Arkansas, but mainly along a differential moisture boundary that moved south across east Texas, extreme southern Arkansas, and north Louisiana. Strong surface instability, and gust fronts that developed from these storms, focused new shower and thunderstorm development, with several of these storms becoming severe. One longer lived severe thunderstorm developed over eastern Upshur County, then merged with another southward moving band of strong thunderstorms, producing widespread wind damage across eastern Upshur, much of Gregg, and northern Rusk County. The cities of Longview and Kilgore were hit hardest, with numerous trees blown down/uprooted, power lines downed, and trees falling onto homes, with at least one known injury reported. A 53-yr old man was killed on the north side of Longview when lightning struck a tree he was standing near in wake of the storm.