HIT BY LIGHTNING!

Well the thing I feared most (besides a category 5 hurricane) actually happened to us on July 16th at approx 3:15 AM. It was a very stormy night with lightning and winds up to about 45 knots. Everyone was awake and Mark and been on deck most of the night trying to hold the canvas covers from blowing away. Unfortunately, we had no warning that weather was coming so it was a total surprise...not that knowing would have kept us from taking a strike but we would have been a little more prepared.
At approx. 3:15 we heard a very loud noise that sounded like a cannon and saw a bright white flash. I knew right away something was not right and yelled out to Mark asking if we had been hit. He went out on deck just in time to see the anchor/strobe light and VHF antenna come crashing down from the top of the mast to the deck....which was confirmation that we indeed did take a hit at the top of the mast. After that the night was a blur.
The list of damaged items so far are as follows:
o VHF Radio and Antenna
o 2 Battery Charges and Monitors
o 2 W-H Autopilots
o Raytheon Chartploter
o Windex wind/direction indicator
o Raytheon Radar and Radome
o Knot Meter
o all electricity to the mast (dead)
o Anchor/Strobe Light
People keep telling us we are lucky that it did not punch a hole in the boat but we do not feel very lucky. Still I suppose we need to count our blessings.
We had hoped not to have to put in a insurance claim but at this point it seems that we will not have a choice as there are some big ticket items that were damaged. It should be interesting trying to repair the boat from Mexico so I will update on how things go on the repairs.