A viral video shows the shocking moment a bolt of lightning struck a Florida biologist while filming a product review. Footage shows Forrest Galante, a wildlife biologist with nearly 280,000 subscribers on YouTube, standing in thigh-high water in Everglades City moments before the lightning bolt flashes next to him.
"We’re getting some great shots. Beautiful day. Water’s clear. Things are going great," he said in a YouTube video. "Towards the end of the day, we come up on the last thing we need to do, and the rain starts to roll in."
Galante said he heard thunder but didn't think anything of it since stormy weather is normal in Florida. As they were doing their last round of filming for the day in a remote swamp, a that's when the lightning bolt struck along with a loud crack of thunder. The whole ordeal sends the entire crew running, including Galante himself.
"I got hit," he said in the clip. "I felt it. Yeah, I got hit. That hurt."
The YouTuber said he couldn't see the lightning since he was facing the camera but remembers getting paralyzed shortly after the sudden strike.
"Through that superconductive water, [the lightning] has just gone shooting up my legs into my chest, into my heart, and into my mouth, actually," Galante recounted. "The whole thing is pretty crazy."
Following the incident, Galante said he and his team weren't seriously injured from the ordeal. The biologist himself claims he felt sore and now has a lingering taste of metal in his mouth. They didn't seek medical help and any symptoms they suffered already started subsiding.