Newcastle Herald (Australia)
January 12, 2008 Saturday
Late Edition
Strike a light;
PROFILE
by Joanne McCarthy
BUREAU of Meteorology weather observer Brad Delaney had never seen a
storm like the one that threw a lightning bolt at Williamtown air
base that made its way to his colleague Martin Babakhan’s bald head.
It was in 1991, and they were both inside a building at the time.
"It was in the days when we used a central radar display to follow
storm activity," Delaney said.
"It was one of the biggest red radar returns [red denoting the
highest level storm activity] I’d ever seen."
It was night. Delaney was standing over the radar screen and Babakhan
was sitting at a nearby desk.
"I said to Martin something like, ‘Come and look at this’, and he
stood up to have a look.
"Then a lightning bolt went from the fluorescent light into Martin
himself. It was such a shock seeing something like that coming out of
his bald head that I started laughing. Then we started to get a bit
worried about him."
Delaney does not remember any sound when it happened.
He does recall "a distinct smell of something, although I still
couldn’t tell you what it was".
The bolt had the appearance of static electricity arcing from the
light to Babakhan, but it was enough of a jolt to wipe out the office
printer, phone and fax machines.
Babakhan had the look of a stunned mullet, Delaney said.
He laughed at the memory last week and pondered whether it was
Babakhan’s shiny head that attracted the lightning.
"If he’d had hair and it was standing up it might have looked even
better," he said.
"There weren’t any signs of burn marks on his head and Martin said he
felt OK. It was just one of those strange things that happens."
Delaney enjoys telling people about the night Babakhan was struck by
lightning inside a building, but after years of tracking electrical
storms he doesn’t take risks outdoors when the sky turns black.
"When I was younger I’d go out surfing in the middle of storms and
think nothing of it, but I don’t go near the beach these days when
there’s storms. People just take it for granted that nothing will
happen, but they shouldn’t."
Babakhan was one of the first people to know when French tourist
Carine Pastorelli, 27, was killed by a lightning strike at Terrigal
Beach on December 4. It was the second recorded direct lightning
strike death in Australia in 2007. She had been in the country for
just two weeks.
As a weather forecaster and Newcastle University lecturer it is his
business to know the weather. As someone who has experienced what a
storm can do first-hand, he has a personal interest in lightning.
"I didn’t know what happened to me at first when the lightning hit
all those years ago," he said.
"The storm was about 10 kilometres away. I’d been up on the roof
twice to look at it because it was quite an amazing sight. It was a
greenish colour, which is the colour you see before hail.
"The lightning bolt that hit the air base came out of the blue, and
that’s how it happens.
"I know it had an effect on me, because for months afterwards I had
trouble finding my house and traffic signals confused me."
He stopped driving for some time.
He saw doctors and had tests and was told there were no physical
signs of change.
"They told me there was nothing to worry about, but I felt
different."
And then "it just righted itself after six months or so".
He said it changed him. Being hit by lightning inside a building and
surviving with a good story to tell, when so many others die in
storms, made him keener to savour life.
It has also made him something of a zealot when it comes to warning
about the power of storms. And after the devastating June long
weekend storms that killed nine people and grounded the Pasha Bulker
on Nobbys Beach, Babakhan knows he has an educated audience in the
Hunter.
"Because of the impact of climate change we are entering a new era in
terms of weather," he said. "We’re going to see more severe weather
events happening with damaging winds, storms and hail, and they’re
the kinds of storms that are the biggest potential lightning
killers."
About 30 per cent of people struck by lightning die.
Carine Pastorelli probably was not aware the Bureau of Meteorology
had issued a storm warning for the day she died. The bolt that killed
her "came out of the blue", said fisherman Peter Bull, who was
standing on the beach in the water when it hit.
She looked like she had been "savaged by dogs", he said.
Martin Babakhan has always loved weather, even when terrifying forces
are unleashed that can kill.
He studied maths and science in high school in Iraq and started work
with the Bureau of Meteorology after migrating to Australia in 1967.
"The standard of education in Iraq at the time was outstanding,
particularly for students like me who lived on a British air force
base."
Babakhan’s father, Isaiah, was born in Armenia, a landlocked former
republic of the Soviet Union bordering Turkey. His father was
orphaned when an estimated 1.2 million Armenians died during World
War I under the Ottoman Empire in what historians have largely agreed
was state-sanctioned mass slaughter.
"The Armenians were Christian. My father was one of many children
taken by missionaries and raised in an orphanage in America," he
recalls.
Isaiah Babakhan returned to the Middle East as an adult to search for
his family, found two sisters and a brother and settled in Iraq. He
trained as an engineer under the British and worked on a British RAF
base in Iraq during World War II.
His son, Martin, was born in 1942.
"Iraq was great, particularly for those of us living at the British
bases.
"I studied science and religion, because it was seen as important
that we understand religion to understand each other, and I speak
Arabic fluently."
Babakhan migrated to Australia in 1967 during a period when the
republic of Iraq underwent a series of rapid government changes that
eventually led to the regime of Saddam Hussein.
While he trained and worked for the Bureau of Meteorology, he watched
and worried for his family as Iraq struggled.
He started work at Sydney, was moved to Tamworth, then to Richmond
and finally to Williamtown.
He lost contact with his father but was able to bring him to
Australia in the early 1990s after the first invasion of Iraq by a
US-led force in 1990.
"He came to live in Sydney and he received a lot of support from the
RSL for his years of working with the British forces in Iraq."
He died eight years ago and is buried in Sydney.
Babakhan has mixed feelings about the current US-led Iraq War.
"I believe the government of Iraq was an evil government controlled
by an evil dictator in Saddam Hussein, but I don’t think Australia
should be there," he said.
"Before our involvement there, Australia was viewed by countries in
the Middle East as one of the leading developed countries they felt
comfortable with, because of our history of accepting migrants.
"Australia has always had a reputation as a nurturing place with a
strong multicultural society, and I think going to Iraq has damaged
that.
"I want to see us being peacemakers and educators, like in East
Timor."
Babakhan is an aviation lecturer at the University of Newcastle,
specialising in weather, after retiring last year as a meteorologist
for Qantas in Sydney.
He is fascinated, rather than terrified or appalled, by climate
change.
"Climate change, when we get down to it, is weather," he said.
"What we have to do now is prepare for weather at concentrations we
possibly haven’t seen before."
"We’re going to see more severe weather with damaging winds, storms
and hail, and they’re the kinds of storms that are the biggest
potential lightning killers."