Thread: Article: Caught in storm on Pickwick

Wow, glad you made it home!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yeah...that's not a place I ever want to be again. I've since added an app on my phone that will push real time weather alerts to me so I can't be caught by surprise again. Three days after this happened I saw the severe weather alerts that were issued after I got on the water. They issued really stern warnings about 60 MPH winds, large damaging hail, continuous cloud-to-ground lightning, torrential rainfall, and flooding. And they went out of their way to tell everyone to move to the interior room of a sturdy building...sadly all I had was my leaky tent...but I dang sure stayed inside it!

Pretty damn awesome! As much as I enjoy watching natures fury from the confines of my house, being caught in a boat, on a big lake, when you have miles of water to travel across to get back to the safety of your truck, when a big storm is baring down on you is no pleasant under taking. I too have been caught 3 times over the years while fishing at Santee Cooper in South Carolina. Last year while watching the radar on my phone, and trying to catch that one last fish, a big storm exploded over me. I thought I could make it across the wide open area of the lake to the boat ramp before it got too bad, I was wrong. While in the middle of the lake, the winds went from 5 to 10, to 30 to 40 with gusts even higher. There was nowhere I could go other than forward. The boat stood on end as the big waves rocked it. Lightning was striking just as you have described, I was terrified. I made a beeline to the bank in an attempt to get to shore and out of harms way. I drove right through a huge stump field, how I didn't hit or land on top of one still amazes me. Once back to the safety of the ramp, I just trembled as the adrenalin ran through me. Great read, and great lessons to be learned here.

A great telling of a terrible experience. I can only hope that someone learns from your experience.I have rode out some small storms (in comparison) and was blessed to come through unscathed. A 10 minute storm on the intercoastal in FL left us ankle deep in water, and had no bilge pump. A longer storm would have done us in. Glad you came through it OK. Good video, I always like to watch the storms come but always from shelter.

Gets pretty hairy when it gets like that on the water.

Glad you made it out OK.

Makes me think of a time with a 14 foot boat, my wife and my 3 year old son when the wind came up on Lake Stockton. No lightning, but a scary ride back to the dock.