Globally, about 100,000 people are injured and 10,000 people killed by lightning - more than the number killed by floods, hurricanes or tornadoes - the British weather bureau, the Met Office, says.

The US National Weather Service says the odds of a person being struck by lightning are one in 5000.

Jaswant Wajisinh Baria, a farmer, was sleeping under a tree when a bolt of lightning struck his thatched house, killing him instantly, the Indian Express reported.

His wife, Sumitra, suffered burns at several places and needed treatment, while Baria’s three-year-old buffalo was also killed, the paper said.

In the last two years, about 60 people have died from lightning strikes each year in the state of Jharkhand alone.

In the state of Orissa, about 250 people lost their lives to lightning each year, and the "death roll" was rising, Padmanabha Behera, under-secretary with the office of Special Relief Commissioner, told The Hindu.

I've witnessed someone getting struck. Scary stuff.

My friend's buddy got killed by a lightning strike and the
current traveled about 50 feet across the ground and hit him. He spent months in rehab, due to the neurological damage he sustained. He said he even had to re-learn how to walk again!

Lightening is unfortunately just as deadly as it is beautiful.