Scout leader killed, teen critical after lightning strike

After seven days of scrambling up and down canyons in the Sierra Nevada, the Boy Scouts were held up by a common summer nuisance -- a lightning storm.

In a wide, grassy meadow near Mount Whitney, the five adults and seven teenagers set up two tarps, keeping away from granite outcroppings to stay as safe as they could from the lightning flashing across the sky.

Then a bolt of lightning hit one of the tarps, killing the troop leader instantly, and injuring seven others, including a teenager who was declared brain-dead on Friday, according to the boy's grandfather.

Park officials said there was little else the troop could have done to prevent the tragedy.

"They did the best they could in the situation they were in," park ranger Alex Picavet said. "They didn't have metal poles, and stayed away from high points."

The troop's assistant scoutmaster, Steve McCullagh, 29, died when the bolt struck Thursday afternoon, the Tulare County coroner's office said.

Teenager Ryan Collins was listed in critical condition at the University Medical Center in Fresno, but his family had given up hope.

The lightning strike came just days after four Scout leaders were electrocuted while putting up a tent at the National Scout Jamboree in Virginia.

Concerning that incident, National Boy Scouts officials on Friday apologized for remarks implying that four adult volunteers shared responsibility for their own deaths while setting up a tent beneath a power line at the national Jamboree in Virginia. They were electrocuted when the tent's metal pole touched power lines.

Spokesman Stephen Medlicott said Friday the group wanted to clear up "some confusion" about the Scouts' position.

The Boy Scouts have "not assigned blame" to the Alaska Scout leaders involved in Monday's deaths, national officials said in a statement issued Thursday.

"We apologize for any statement we've made which might be construed as assigning blame."

The statement came a day after Jamboree spokesman Gregg Shields said the Alaska group had ignored Scouting teachings by putting the tent under a power line at Fort A.P. Hill, the Army base where the 10-day event is being held.

The Virginia-based tent company hired for the job sent two workers to set up two dining canopies at the Jamboree, Alaska Scout officials said. The tent workers set up the first canopy while the leaders and Scouts set up sleeping tents, Bill Haines, a Scout executive in Alaska, said in a statement Thursday.

The accident occurred when the contractors asked the Alaska leaders for help raising the second canopy, Haines said.

Some Scouts had been watching as the metal pole at the center of the large, white dining tent touched power lines. The men were touching the metal and were electrocuted.