By Bruno Matarazzo Jr.
Staff writer
July 24, 2008 06:39 am PEABODY — Even though Barbara Donlin was inside her home in West Peabody when it was struck by lightning yesterday, she can't describe the sound. "It was like nothing I ever heard," Donlin said. Donlin was outside her home on LeBlanc Drive yesterday waiting for crews to board up the hole in her roof. A bolt of lightning tore a hole through her roof to a second-floor office. Donlin had been inside that room just seconds before the lightning struck. The surge of electricity knocked out power to her home, blew out electrical sockets in the office and caused the garage door to open. The lightning didn't start a fire, but firefighters did have to open up the attic to be sure no small fires were hidden. The lightning yesterday was just one of many weather-related incidents yesterday to pummel the North Shore as a fusillade of thunderstorms worked its way across the region. Yesterday's stormy weather was just the latest in a long series this month. While things were tempestuous up here, the weather was far more severe in southeastern Massachusetts and Rhode Island, where there were tornado watches and even a water spout — a tornado over the water — in Barrington, R.I. Today marks the 10th thunderstorm so far this month on the North Shore, according to meteorologist and retired Salem State College professor Arthur Francis. The amount of rain so far is 2.95 inches, including the 1.04 inches of rain that fell before 5 p.m. yesterday, Francis said. The average rainfall amount in a month is 3.06 inches, and the average number of thunderstorms is five. Though thunderstorms are nothing new to New England, this year's spate of Florida-like boomers may be a bit more intense than residents are accustomed to. The reason for the tropical-type weather this month has been from two different weather systems that have passed through, Francis said. The first few days of the month sparked a series of storms when a warm air mass passed by a cold front that was moving west to east. For the last five days, there has been a stationary front with warm air on one side and cool air on the other. "The warm air lifts up and causes all the thunderstorms to form," Francis said. "It's not unusual, we've had situations like this before."
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