FUJAIRAH // Just a few days ago, Ali Saeed Al Mehrzi loved the rain.
During the drier seasons, he and the rest of the villagers of Wadi Al Ejeili had prayed for heavy downpours.
But after lightning took his 19-year-old daughter's life on Wednesday afternoon, striking her chest as she stood outside a college campus during a rainstorm, Mr Al Mehrzi says he cannot even "look at it" any more.
"I know it was written, I know it was fate and it was nobody's fault, but I still can't look at the rain the same way any more," he said yesterday, fighting back tears.
Sitting inside the majlis at his home in the wadi, south of Ras Al Khaimah, he was surrounded by family members and friends who came to pay their respects and pass on their condolences.
Mr Al Mehrzi buried his daughter, Sabha Al Mehrzi, at 7.30am on Thursday, at the wadi's cemetery only a few minutes away from the family home.
Sabha, the eldest in a family of seven children, was a foundation student at the Fujairah Women's College, part of the Higher Colleges of Technology. Officials from the college came to the wadi yesterday to visit the family.
There were many rumours and misleading reports of the incident that took her life. Twitter and Facebook carried tweets and updates with false information from people who had heard about the incident.
Among the false rumours was that Sabha was "taking photos with her mobile phone" while she was outside in the parking lot with her friend, and that she was killed by debris thrown up by lightning that had struck a college building.
"All I know is that my sweet daughter is gone. The details are not important," Mr Al Mehrzi said. "She had a lot of ambition to make something of herself."
Her laugh is what the family will miss the most, he said. "She had such a contagious laugh."
Yesterday, her mother was not receiving anyone, having locked herself in one of the rooms in the back of the family home, surrounded by immediate family. She had fainted when she heard the news about her daughter.
The police confirmed that the lightning hit Sabha directly in the chest, leaving burn marks. Her heart is believed to have stopped immediately.
"There was no metallic pole or anything specific we can point to as the cause for this accident," said Lt Col Saeed Al Yammahi, the spokesman for Fujairah Police.
Sabha's friend, Afayef Al Hadadi, 22, was right next to her at the time of the incident, but the lightning did not strike her. Afayef did, however, injure her head and arm and was in hospital until Thursday afternoon.
Nine others were taken into hospital on Wednesday, receiving treatment for shock.
They were released the same night.
The Crown Prince of Fujairah, Sheikh Mohammed bin Hamad, visited them at Fujairah Hospital.
Lt Col Al Yammahi recalled a similar "strange incident" about 15 years ago. A boy was "burnt on the spot" when he was hit by lightning as he played football with other boys in a playground in Fujairah city.
"Storms are unpredictable, people should be more cautious," Lt Col Al Yammahi said.
"There were other girls there in the parking lot but only she was hit," he said.
Officials at the women's college took The National for a full tour of the premises, and to the exact spot where the lightning struck.
"There are no fallen buildings, no shattered glass except for a back door that the wind pushed back and some leaks," said Dr Dave Pelham, the director of the Fujairah Women's College, dismissing the fictitious reports.
"Here it is. This is where the freak accident happened." He pointed to two holes in the ground at the faculty car park.
The lightning struck about 11 car spaces from the door of the Annex 3 building of the college. The lot was about half-full with cars.
"At about 3.00 in the afternoon, during a very strong storm, one of the strongest in about eight years according to my staff, the two girls were seen in the parking lot by a female security guard who told them to go back inside," Dr Pelham said.
"Then when the security guard was about to call out to them again since they didn't move, that is when the lightning hit."
The security guard carried Afayef, who had fallen from the impact of the lightning strike, Dr Pelham said.
Two teachers rushed to Sabha, performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation and called an ambulance, which arrived between 20 and 30 minutes later. The floods had delayed it.
A student who happened to be recording the rainstorm caught the incident on her mobile phone, and gave a copy of the video to police.
Classes were not in session yesterday, but will resume on Sunday. In honour of Sabha, the college will decide on a group project to bring the students together.
"We will most likely build a well in honour of Sabha in our artificial wadi on the college campus," Dr Pelham said.
Looking to the future, he said, "We will do whatever is in our power to stop students from going out during dangerous weather. But in the end, they are adults and all we can do is warn them about the risks."
Khaija Al Mehrzi, 20, a business student at the college who is from the same tribe as Sabha, was at a different corner of the campus at the time of the incident.
Khaija said she was "anxious" about going back.
"It could have been any of us."
