Last night's rare and lengthy thunderstorm around the Bay Area caused upwards of 7,000 flashes in the sky and 1,200 ground strikes according to meteorologists, and everyone should be braced for a second round today as conditions that make these things possible remain.
Monday's storm caused several wildfires down in Santa Clara County, where one fire caused by a lightning strike is still spreading near Wunderlich County Park in Woodside as of Tuesday morning. As CBS 5 reports, crews down there were battling multiple vegetation fires caused by lightning starting around 7 p.m. Monday.
No structures are imminently threatened, and it's unclear how much acreage the fire has covered.
At SFO Monday night, a worker driving a vehicle that tows planes was struck by lightning according to a manager there, speaking to KRON 4. They say the worker was not seriously injured and was not hospitalized as a result of the lightning strike.
So far no other reports of people being struck during last night's storm have come in.
A low pressure system lingering over the ocean, which has replaced the high pressure that had kept us so warm over the last week, is what's causing these thunder-prone conditions, and another wave of pyrotechnics could be expected tonight over parts of the Bay Area.
As the Chronicle reports, temperatures are expected to drop again this evening, and then things will warm up again before the weekend after the storms pass.
Below, one more dramatic shot from Rincon Hill, taken by SFist contributor E. Chang.
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