The mountain was still two hours away when I heard the first rumble. It was barely noon, earlier than expected, and I was exposed on a ridge with nowhere obvious to go. That familiar calculus began—the one every mountain traveler eventually learns to run: How bad will this get? How fast? What are my options?

Lightning kills more outdoor recreationists than any other weather phenomenon. Not because it's particularly common, but because it's unpredictable and absolutely unforgiving. A single bolt carries enough energy to stop your heart instantly. There's no fighting it, no powering through. Your only defense is not being where it strikes.

The good news is that lightning risk is manageable. Not through luck or speed, but through understanding. Learn to read the atmosphere's warning signs, know which terrain features become death traps and which offer relative safety, and develop a practiced response for when prevention fails. This isn't about eliminating risk—that's impossible outdoors. It's about making informed decisions with incomplete information, which is really what all adventure comes down to.

Lightning doesn't ambush you—it telegraphs its arrival for anyone paying attention. The challenge is that we're often focused on the trail, the summit, the next waypoint. Building weather awareness into your adventure rhythm is the first layer of defense.

Start with the forecast before you leave. Mountain weather services provide increasingly accurate predictions for afternoon thunderstorm probability. But forecasts are probabilities, not guarantees. The real skill is reading real-time indicators in the field. Watch for cumulus clouds building vertically—innocent cotton puffs in the morning can tower into anvil-shaped cumulonimbus by afternoon. That transformation typically takes two to four hours, which is your planning window.

The afternoon pattern is your most reliable enemy. Solar heating drives convection, which drives storms. In mountain environments, peak lightning risk typically falls between 2 PM and 6 PM. This isn't a rule—I've seen morning storms that violated every expectation—but it's a pattern worth respecting. Plan exposed terrain for early morning. Be descending or in shelter by early afternoon. The summit photo isn't worth your life.

Learn the flash-to-bang method: count seconds between lightning flash and thunder, divide by five for approximate miles. Under thirty seconds means the storm is within six miles and you're in the danger zone. But here's what people miss—lightning can strike ten to fifteen miles ahead of a storm's leading edge. If you can hear thunder at all, you're potentially at risk. The phrase "when thunder roars, go indoors" exists because it's true.

Takeaway

Lightning risk is highest in the afternoon and telegraphed hours in advance—the question is whether you're paying attention before your options narrow.

When a storm approaches, terrain becomes everything. Lightning follows predictable physics—it seeks the path of least resistance to ground. Your job is ensuring that path doesn't run through you. This means understanding what attracts strikes and what offers relative protection.

Avoid being the highest point in any area. This sounds obvious until you're on a ridge, in an open meadow, or standing beside the only tree in a field. All of these make you or nearby objects the preferential strike point. Summits, ridgelines, isolated trees, shallow caves, and bodies of water are high-risk zones. Metal objects don't attract lightning but will conduct it efficiently through you if struck nearby.

The ideal position is in a low area surrounded by terrain features of uniform height—a forest of similar-sized trees, for instance, or a depression in rolling terrain. You want to be shorter than your surroundings without being at the bottom of a drainage where ground current could flow. Look for what climbers call the "lightning position": lower than the highest features, higher than the lowest points, away from anything tall and isolated.

Inside forests, move toward the interior and away from the tallest or most isolated trees. In open terrain, seek depressions or gullies that aren't drainage channels. If you're near cliffs, stay away from both the edge above and the base below—ground current travels along cliff faces. There's no perfectly safe outdoor position during an electrical storm, only positions that are less likely to kill you. Choose the least bad option and commit to it.

Takeaway

Lightning follows physics, not malice—understand what attracts strikes and position yourself to be neither the highest point nor the lowest point in any area.

Sometimes you do everything right and still find yourself exposed when the storm hits. Maybe it arrived faster than predicted. Maybe the terrain offered no good options. Now you're managing an emergency, not planning an adventure. Having a practiced response matters because stressed minds don't think clearly.

If you're in a group, spread out. Twenty feet minimum between people. This feels counterintuitive—we want to huddle together when scared. But if lightning strikes one person, ground current can arc through closely grouped bodies. Spacing ensures that a single strike doesn't incapacitate everyone, leaving someone able to perform rescue. Discuss this before storms threaten so the instruction doesn't seem bizarre in the moment.

The lightning crouch is your last-resort position: squat low on the balls of your feet, feet together, arms wrapped around your knees, head down. The goal is minimizing both your height and your ground contact area. Standing is too tall. Lying flat maximizes ground current exposure. Sitting on an insulating pad—your pack, a foam sleeping pad—adds a layer of protection, though don't count on it. Stay in this position until thunder has been absent for thirty minutes.

Remove metal frame packs and set them aside, but don't waste time stripping every piece of gear. Disable trekking poles rather than carry them vertically. If you're in a tent, the tent offers zero protection—get out if better terrain exists nearby. The statistics on tent lightning strikes are sobering. Finally, know basic CPR. Lightning strike victims can often be resuscitated if breathing and circulation are restored quickly. Don't assume someone struck is dead—they may just need intervention you can provide.

Takeaway

When caught out, spread your group, get low on insulating material, and remember that lightning strike victims are often saveable if you act quickly.

Lightning demands respect but not paralysis. Every outdoor enthusiast will eventually find themselves calculating storm risk in real time. The goal isn't avoiding that situation entirely—that would mean never going outside—but building the awareness and protocols that make those calculations second nature.

Prevention is everything. Check forecasts. Watch the sky. Plan your exposed terrain for early hours and have descent options identified before you need them. Most lightning incidents happen to people who saw the storm coming and made optimistic choices anyway.

When prevention fails, terrain selection and practiced response take over. Know what makes ground dangerous. Know how to position yourself and your group. Know that the thirty minutes after the last thunder matters as much as the height of the storm. Lightning doesn't negotiate, but it does follow rules. Learn them.