Lightning strike injures two as thunderstorms roll through Boston

By Maddie Hanna and Padraig Shea, Globe Correspondents

As thunderstorms dumped torrents of rain, lightning struck multiple times throughout Boston this afternoon, sparking fires in Roxbury and South Boston, and injuring two people on a boat in the harbor.

The boaters were taken to the hospital after reports of a lightning strike near Lewis Wharf, Boston Emergency Medical Services Lieutenant Joe Thomas said.

Thomas said he did not know the condition of the boaters, whom paramedics took to Massachusetts General Hospital around 4:30 p.m.

Andrew Oliver, 39, of Waltham, said he was on the boat when the lightning struck.

"The fog had just lifted.We had just taken down the sails to come in. There was a flash, a very short pause, then a boom," said Oliver, who declined to give the names of the other people on the boat.

In a strange but all-too-familiar development in this thunderstormy summer, forecasters said still more storms were possible this evening.

The Boston Fire Department was deluged with about 100 phone calls in an hour, spokesman Steven MacDonald said.

“It was just call after call after call as the storm rolled through here pretty quickly,” he said. “It was all weather-related. We just got flooded.”

The department also received numerous calls for flooded streets, downed power lines, and trees leaning on power lines, he said.

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