Photographer captures lightning strike off coast

THIS stunning image of lightning striking the sea off Southwick was captured by photographer Sam Phillippe.
Sam Phillippe took this picture of lightning off the Southwick coastSam Phillippe took this picture of lightning off the Southwick coast
Sam Phillippe took this picture of lightning off the Southwick coast

He was woken up by last night’s thunder, at about 1.20am, and said that after watching for a few minutes, he decided to ‘go for it.’

Sam said: “I have only ever captured one lightning photo before, in Kuala Lumpur, but have always been anxious to get more since I upgraded my camera. I literally threw on my clothes, grabbed my camera bag and tripod and jumped in the car, up to the fields near Foredown Tower on top of the hill.”

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Sam was inspired to get into photography by his brother Russ, and now works in wedding photography and in baby portraiture photography.

He said that when he arrived near Foredown Tower, the storm was still quite a way off the shore, so he started shooting.

“After maybe ten minutes, I noticed there was another storm just to the north of me, and it seemed that both storms were converging,” said Sam. “I wanted to keep shooting but I felt my position was becoming dangerous and I didn’t want any lightning erasing the photos I had just taken, had I been struck, so I headed home just in time before the rain. Looking at the photos on the computer, it was clear how close the storm actually was. One of the photos shows the lightning just over Southwick beach, probably two miles away from my position.”

• For more details about Sam’s professional photography, log on to www.phillippe-photography.com and www.samphillippe.com. To watch a video of the storm taken from Broadwater Green by photographer Eddie Mitchell, click here.

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