Dhaka: At least 13 people were killed and 15 others injured when lightning struck a village mosque in northeastern Bangladesh, officials said on Saturday.
"Lightning struck them just after they completed offering the (Ramadan's Tarabih) prayers and were coming out of the makeshift mosque at Dharmapasha area of Sunamganj district," a police official told a news agency.
Ten people were killed instantly when lightning struck yesterday, while three died overnight at a local hospital where some 15 people were being treated, some of them with critical wounds.
Police said the lightning struck the tin-roofed makeshift mosque as a storm accompanied by thunderbolts lashed the neighbourhood at the remote frontier village where waterway is the only means of communication with Dharmapasha sub-district and Sunamganj district.
"It takes one at least three hours to reach the village from the nearest town of Dharmapasha...The injured were brought to the town on boats overnight with burn injuries," a local village leader was quoted by the local media as saying.
PTI
First Published: Saturday, August 11, 2012, 13:08