God works in mysterious ways

I really don't know what category to put this in.  And this is via Steel Turman, so sorry for all of you who have seen this already.  Over there, I mean.  Or anywhere, for that matter.

Via the great AP Teletype Oracle, we find that:

WACO, Texas (AP) - A pastor performing a baptism was electrocuted inside his church Sunday morning after grabbing a microphone while partially submerged, a church employee said.

The Rev. Kyle Lake, 33, was standing in water up to his shoulder in a baptismal at University Baptist Church when he was electrocuted, said Jamie Dudley, a church business administrator and wife of another pastor there.

For those of you who don't know for sure, yes, "electrocuted" means killed by electrical means.  It's kind of awful—I don't know what to say.

The woman Lake was baptizing was not injured, Dudley said.

... "He was grabbing the microphone so everyone could hear," Dudley said. "It's the only way you can be loud enough."

... Lake, who had a wife and three children, had been at the church for nine years, the last seven as pastor, Dudley said.

This is terrible, and I find I can't make a "joke" or humorous aside that wouldn't be in terrible taste.  After all, a guy died here.

As a former electrical professional, it strikes me as extremely foolish to grab a microphone like he did without first having established that the system was properly grounded—and even then, if he was going to use a mic while standing in water, he should have used a wireless mic, not something connected to line power.  But he may not have known that, and his ignorance meant his death.  Death by ordinary household 120VAC while doing God's work.

This is all so very ironic.  Somehow this reminds me of the Old Testament, but I'm not sure exactly where...

Comments

[Rob]

Small world. The pastor in question is a friend of a friend of mine. I always thought that mic signals were +-4.5v AC at milliamp current? Maybe they had a big ground loop going at the board and he grounded it for them? Dunno. My buddy in the Navy told me once a ground-rat managed to kill himself with a 9v battery. Wanted to know what the impedance of a person was so he stabbed both his thumbs with the probes from his multi tester. The 9v in the impedance tester running across his heart was sufficent to stop it. I've done that before but never sub-dermal.