Livonia couple's cars hit by lightning in 4th strike at property

LIVONIA, Mich. (WJBK) - A Livonia man's truck antennae became a lightning rod Tuesday night. 

It is a one-in-a-million chance, but it has happened at a Livonia couple's house four times.

"This is a nice example of where the lightning struck (on the driveway) from apparently off the car," said David. "You can see how hot it got, it blew (the antennae) end off."

David and Janet were watching the Red Wings when the unlikely happened.

"When the whole backyard lit up," he said. "And the sound was at the same time and scared everyone in the house."

They peaked outside and David's F-150 truck lights were all on. A retired Ford guy, he went to investigate.

"I tried to start the engine and nothing starts up," he said. 

Then he checked out Janet's SUV.

"That doesn't start either," David said. "And it's got all kinds of error messages popping up on the screen."

He knew right away what happened after finding the charred antennae in the yard and marks on the driveway with asphalt missing from the lightning strike.

"We are lucky we were not in the car at the time," he said.

They couple had thought they were out of the woods after getting rid of a giant tree in the front yard of their house - but nope.

And when they dialed up their insurance company they were met with a very pregnant pause at the other end of the phone.

"AAA has never heard of it, the claims adjuster asked a lot of questions," Janet said.

Not sure if there was anything they could have done to prevent it, but they are hoping their luck turns around.

The vehicles will be covered by insurance but David and Janet do have to pay their deductible.