In this article · 3 sections
On Sunday afternoon, August 23, a family arrived at a relative’s house in Margate, Florida for dinner. The weather turned while they were getting out of the car. They ran for the front door.
Kenya Glasgow, 31, and her two-year-old daughter Kennedi did not make it inside. They were struck by lightning on the sidewalk, on the 7900 block of Northwest 1st Street, at around 2:30 in the afternoon. Margate Police and fire rescue crews found them and began CPR. Both died shortly after arriving at the hospital.
Kameron Glasgow, Kenya’s husband and Kennedi’s father, was standing a few feet away. He was close enough to feel the electricity travel through his legs. He turned around and saw them.
Kennedi’s twin sister, Kensli, was still in the car.
Kameron and Kenya would have celebrated their fourth wedding anniversary in November.
The Family
In a post shared the next day, Kameron wrote that he had lost his best friend, and that his surviving daughter had lost hers. He asked people who had known his wife and daughter to hold onto what they brought into their lives. He ended with a line that has stayed with us: it doesn’t take much to be kind.
Kameron described Kennedi as having the biggest heart in the world.
He also said something about Kensli that is difficult to read. A two-year-old cannot understand that her twin is gone. He knows he has to be okay, because she is still here.
We are quoting him only briefly and only because he chose to share it publicly. The rest belongs to his family.
If you’d like to support Kameron and Kensli, you can find the family’s GoFundMe here (opens in a new tab).
What the Sky was Doing
Neighbors claimed they had seen thunder and lightning that afternoon and assumed it was an ordinary summer South Florida storm, until a strike hit close enough to shake their houses.
The National Weather Service reported five cloud-to-ground strikes within a single mile of where the Glasgows were hit.
The odds of any one person being struck in Florida are around one in 500,000. Kenya and Kennedi are the third and fourth lightning deaths in Florida this year.
Why we do what we do
Lightning kills people who are doing completely ordinary things. Walking to the front door, loading a trunk, standing in a yard, it is the most common severe weather threat in the country and the one people take least seriously, right up until it takes someone from them. Every few weeks, another family finds that out.
Everyone here chose to spend their career on this. Most of us can name the moment that put us in this field: a close call, a warning that came too late, years spent in forecasting watching these same headlines come around every summer. Our founder spent twenty years at the National Weather Service before starting this company. Nobody ends up doing this work by accident.
This is why we do what we do. For the seconds. For the chance that somebody, somewhere, gets enough of them.
Our hearts are with Kameron, with Kensli, and with everyone who loved Kenya and Kennedi Glasgow.
Madison Deese