Finnish brothers killed by lightning as they heated sauna

HELSINKI – Finnish police say they suspect two men died from a lightning strike’s electric charge while they were heating up a sauna near a summer cottage in eastern Finland.

The brothers, born in 1950 and 1953, had arrived at the cottage in Juuka, a community of 3,200 in the Northern Karelia region, with their sister and gone out to heat up sauna late Friday when a very loud bang was heard.

The woman ran out of the cottage to find her brothers on the ground.

A nearby spruce tree was also damaged. Police suspect the lightning struck the tree, and then its powerful electric charge was conducted into the men’s bodies by the wet soil.

Finland does not often see lightning deaths – about one every two years, on average.