DALE — A flying branch from a lightning-struck tree badly damaged a cabin in northern Grant County during an electrical storm on June 17.

Georgia Burnett, who lives with her husband, Norm, in the cabin on Trout Road a few miles south of Dale, said a bolt of lightning struck a large fir tree near the cabin and sent branches and shards of wood flying in all directions.

“It just exploded,” Burnett said. “It was just crazy.”

One large branch, nearly the size of a tree in its own right, pierced the cabin’s roof and came through the ceiling into the kitchen.

Burnett said she was in Portland at the time to see her granddaughter’s dance recital, but her husband was sleeping on the couch when the lightning struck. He’s hearing-impaired, but he was feeling the effects of the lightning strike’s tremendous noise days later.

“He was already deaf, but now he’s really deaf,” Burnett said. “His ears are still ringing.”