Sprites, elves, and blue jets. Gnomes, trolls, pixies, blue starters, and upward super bolts! All the ingredients for a good fairy tale or — a bad storm!?!

All of these are forms of high-altitude lightning, but the most dangerous for people is sheet lightning.

In Canada, 90 per cent of lightning-related deaths have occurred in four provinces – Ontario, Quebec, Saskatchewan, and Alberta. And about 85 per cent of those deaths were men.

Calgary has seen its share of electrified demises.

In 1915 sweethearts Charles Tawse and May Swindell were struck down at an intersection in Mount Royal, while Staff Sergeant Bossange of the...