Lightning strikes in San Francisco were caught on video people on Twitter on Tuesday, and bolts appears to strike the tip top of the Transamerica Pyramid — which is not unheard of — as well as Sutro Tower.
While the city was enduring another round of heavy rain and about three minutes of intense hail, during KRON4's noon broadcast, their camera feed catches a bolt of lighting that pretty surely struck the top of the Pyramid, though they're not confirming that to be the case. Even though you don't see any more of the bolt below the building's top, the station is just calling it lighting "over the Transamerica Pyramid."
KTVU's Kate Rooney, though, is calling it like she sees it.
Wow. This is a screen grab of lightning hitting the top of the Transamerica Pyramid, live on @kron4news #SanFrancisco #SFBayArea #Weather pic.twitter.com/PaX9QnghzJ
— Kate Rooney (@TheKateRooney) January 10, 2023
And we have two other angles on it here, from SF residents who also had a view of the building on camera:
Me: So noisy!! I can’t hear anyone on the call! The storm: — (caption: Lightning striking the Transamerica Pyramid in SF) pic.twitter.com/dZQMWc7QJy
— Christina B Campbell (@CampbellChrisB) January 10, 2023
Lightning strike on Transamerica building #sfrain #storms #AtmosphericRiver #transamerica pic.twitter.com/fRTJMn10mO
— Quibble Nibble (@quibblenibble) January 10, 2023
The building does not appear to be affected or damaged.
And we know that this has happened before — even though lightning is a relative rarity in SF. In January 2017, multiple Twitter users posted photos and video of lightning striking the tip of the Transamerica building.
Lightning strikes San Francisco's Transamerica Pyramid and nearby tower shortly after 4am. Credit: Simon Allardice #CAwx @NWSBayArea pic.twitter.com/4Lcrj2OstX
— Rob Mayeda (@RobMayeda) January 20, 2017
A lightning bolt also struck Sutro Tower during the same hour of unstable weather, and this was also well documented on Twitter.
Lightning hitting Sutro Tower amid heavy rain and small hail in San Francisco. ⛈️ #SF #CAwx pic.twitter.com/UX4MFYhSiO
— Daniel Alrick (@SFmeteorologist) January 10, 2023
Caught a strike on Sutro tower! pic.twitter.com/6JVdJouU74
— Daniel Haire (@hairessy) January 10, 2023
Local meteorologists assure us that all of this should pass by 2 p.m. — at least the very stormy part. More rain is likely this evening, and plenty more arrives tomorrow.
This post has been updated throughout to include the lightning strike at Sutro Tower.
Top image via quibblenibble/Twitter