Jogger Wearing iPod Gets Struck By Lightning

Here's a handy tip for your joggers: If you think you might get caught in a thunderstorm, you may want to leave your music player at home.

Doctors at Vancouver General Hospital in Canada say a 37-year-old jogger wearing an iPod was burned on his chest, neck and face after the man was struck by lightning in 2005. The burns traced the path of the earphones.

Doctors wrote about the case in a recent letter to the New England Journal of Medicine, and said the man's eardrums were ruptured and the tiny bones in his middle ears were dislocated.

His jawbone also broke in four places and both jaw joints were dislocated, probably because the electric current made his jaw muscles contract violently. They say the metal in the earphones helped channel the current and cause the injuries.

"Although the use of a device such as an iPod may not increase the chances of being struck by lightning, in this case, the combination of sweat and metal earphones directed the current to, and through, the patient's head," they said.

"I think that this has the potential to occur with any sort of headphones," Doctor Heffernan said.

Two years later, more than half the man's hearing is gone and he cannot hear high frequency sounds, even with hearing aids.

"He still jogs, and he bought a new iPod after the incident, but he leaves it at home now when he goes jogging. I think the message should be that, in the event that you're jogging and get caught in a thunderstorm, make sure your iPod is not in contact with your skin and remove the earphones from your ear," Heffernan said.

The National Weather Service estimates that a person's odds of being struck by lightning are 1 in 5,000. About 10 percent of those who are struck die.

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