A 47-year-old father of four from Utah, Steve Matheson, has died after being struck by lightning while jet skiing off Fort De Soto Park near St Petersburg, Florida. The incident occurred at around 6.30pm on Saturday; he was taken to hospital but later died. His death has renewed warnings from meteorologists about the danger of sudden summer storms and the risk of the first lightning strike, which can hit before people realise a storm has arrived.

Matheson's death is the third fatal or serious lightning strike in Florida within a week, following the deaths of a mother and daughter in Margate and a child injured near Boynton Beach, and marks the 13th lightning fatality in the US this year. His family has launched a GoFundMe campaign, raising over $38,000 of a $100,000 target, to cover the cost of returning his body to Utah. Florida is described by health authorities as America's "lightning capital", recording over 2,000 lightning-related injuries in the past 50 years, though officials note only around 10% of the 37 million annual US lightning strikes prove fatal.