Woman dies 12 days after being hit by lightening

A British woman has died 12 days after being hit by lightning while playing golf on holiday in Turkey.

Sarah Oldham, 39, suffered a cardiac arrest after the bolt hit her as she sheltered under an umbrella when it started to rain. Her husband Alex looked round after hearing ‘an almighty crack of thunder’, only to see his wife lying unconscious on the ground.

He called for help and carried out CPR on his wife until paramedics arrived at the Sueno Golf Hotel near Belek on Turkey’s southern coast. The care home manager died nearly two weeks later after she was airlifted back to a hospital in the UK.

Alex, 36, said the forecast was clear when the couple went out to play golf, but it started to rain really hard about an hour and a half into the game.

He said: ‘Sarah went to one side of the fairway, which is surrounded by thousands of really tall trees, and I went to the other, we both crouched down and put our umbrellas up. There was an almighty crack of thunder, I turned around and couldn’t see Sarah’s umbrella. ‘I ran over to her and I realised she had been struck.’

She was flown home to the UK in a private jet but died at Peterborough City Hospital on Saturday.

Alex said: ‘I knew there was not much hope, but we didn’t want to give up hoping while there was a even a glimmer of a chance. Once we got to Peterborough I was told she only had a few hours left so her mum and I sat with her and said our goodbyes. What I loved about her was the fact we could play sports together. We enjoyed playing tennis, table tennis as well as golf and she really went all out to be the best she could be. In recent she years she really improved to such an extent I had to up my own game to beat her.’

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