{"id":331653,"date":"2026-07-07T11:12:11","date_gmt":"2026-07-07T11:12:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/331653\/"},"modified":"2026-07-07T11:12:11","modified_gmt":"2026-07-07T11:12:11","slug":"more-than-a-dozen-911-calls-made-after-deadly-lightning-strike-at-fort-myers-beach-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/331653\/","title":{"rendered":"More than a dozen 911 calls made after deadly lightning strike at Fort Myers Beach | News"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>FORT MYERS BEACH, Fla. (WINK)\u2014A 51-year-old man <a href=\"https:\/\/www.winknews.com\/news\/lee\/lightning-strike-victim-on-fort-myers-beach-identified-as-51-year-old-man\/article_cb30198a-0c18-434f-8b99-179a9598e237.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">died after being struck by lightning<\/a> in the Gulf of Mexico while with his wife, daughter and son-in-law.<\/p>\n<p>WINK News obtained nearly <a href=\"https:\/\/www.winknews.com\/news\/someone-is-screaming-911-calls-reveal-frantic-moments-after-fatal-lightning-strike-on-fort-myers\/article_47bf726b-b4ca-4dcc-b15a-b592fdc8289c.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">30 minutes of 911 calls<\/a> that captured the desperate moments when bystanders tried to save Viktar Kiryk&#8217;s life. More than a dozen people called 911 after the lightning strike.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We have a person struck by lightning out on the beach,&#8221; one caller said.<\/p>\n<p>The recordings reveal the moment people pulled Kiryk out of the water and started CPR. A 911 dispatcher calmly gave instructions as people performed chest compressions and mouth-to-mouth breathing.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Everyone listen very carefully to me. Make sure he is flat on his back and remove anything under his head,&#8221; the 911 operator said.<\/p>\n<p>Katie Abdalla, a Maryland paramedic on vacation, ran over to start CPR.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;He had a pretty good, like, burn mark from, like, his shoulder down his chest,&#8221; Abdalla said. &#8220;We had plenty of hands to help.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>What they did not have was a detectable heart rhythm for the defibrillator. Firefighters pronounced Kiryk dead at the scene.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;He\u2026He&#8217;s definitely DOA\u2026I&#8217;m telling you this\u2026.He&#8217;s DOA,&#8221; a caller said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Okay, well, we&#8217;re still going to try,&#8221; the operator responded.<\/p>\n<p>Danielle Sturgill knows the dangers of lightning all too well. One year ago, Sturgill and her friends were visiting Marco Island when storms rolled in and they ran to a tiki hut for cover.<\/p>\n<p>The video shows lightning directly striking the hut.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;A very heavy pressure on the top of my head, and then I was totally unconscious,&#8221; Sturgill said.<\/p>\n<p>Sturgill and her friends survived but still carry scars, both physical and mental.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Trauma, of course, I definitely do not take a storm lightly at all,&#8221; Sturgill said. &#8220;Don&#8217;t think it can&#8217;t happen to you.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FORT MYERS BEACH, Fla. (WINK)\u2014A 51-year-old man died after being struck by lightning in the Gulf of Mexico&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":331654,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[209,211,210,28,897,1695,9662,90029],"class_list":["post-331653","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cape-coral","tag-cape-coral","tag-cape-coral-headlines","tag-cape-coral-news","tag-florida","tag-fort-myers","tag-fort-myers-beach","tag-lightning","tag-lightning-strike"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331653","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=331653"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331653\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/331654"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=331653"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=331653"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=331653"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}