When a bolt of lightning struck Lori Docherty's house, northeast of Stettler, she visibly jumped.
There's no doubt about it, as she caught the moment on video Saturday evening.
"Holy, that hit the house. That hit the house," she can be heard calling inside to her son.
In the cell phone footage, sparks fly and the entire sky is lit up.
"There had been a few bad lightnings that had been really close and scared me, but then I went back out anyhow," Docherty told CTV News in an interview on Sunday.
"All of a sudden it hit an antenna on the house and I saw the sparks coming out of the plug in."
What's more incredulous than the fact that she happened to be filming when it happened is that her neighbour unknowingly caught it on camera, too.
Lynne Payne, a neighbour three houses down the street, was also standing on her deck watching the show with her husband and mother-in-law.
When they went inside and played back the footage, Payne says they were shocked—figuratively.
"We saw the sparks flying off of the house and lightning hit that tower," Payne said.
"Oh my goodness. Something went on there," she remembers thinking. "And sure enough, fire trucks started rolling in."
Although Docherty said she doesn't know the full extent of the damage, there was no fire started, and no people or animals were injured. However, most of the electronics in the house no longer work, and there are burn marks around one outlet and on the carpet.
"I can't believe it happened still. I'm just really glad it wasn't worse than it was."
The storm was one of a few the area has seen in the last few weeks, but by Payne's measure, one of the largest.
"(I'm) just glad Lori and her family are okay, and the animals and everybody else in the neighbourhood," Payne said.
"But it was a beautiful sight."
Stettler is located about 80 kilometres east of Red Deer, at the junction of Highways 12 and 56.
