Man Returns to Job After Lightning Strike

More than three months after being hit by lightning in the parking lot of a Calabasas business park, Guy Arnone returned to a hero’s welcome at work, saying he tires easily but was eager to get back to his sales job.

“I’ve been doing well,” the 30-year-old real estate loan broker told a group of co-workers and reporters Friday. “I’m very happy with my progress. I had a lot of pain the first month, but it’s better now.”

Joining a party to welcome the Canyon Country resident back to work were his wife, Kristen, and 2-year-old daughter, Gabrielle, as well as other employees of the business complex where Arnone was hit, and a member of the emergency team who tended to him minutes after the March 14 accident.

Arnone said he was overwhelmed by the support he has received since the accident, and was concerned that some of the women who saw him that day had been frightened.

“I’ve been waiting a long time to hug you--ever since I saw you fall,” said Fran Kiradjian, a Woodland Hills woman who had been looking out her second-floor office window when he was hit.

Arnone had just declined an offer of an umbrella to shield him from the downpour and was walking to his car when the bolt struck. He said he remembers nothing of the events of that day, but those at the welcoming party cannot forget.

Joe Abdullah, 28, of Malibu, one of the first people on the scene, covered Arnone with a blanket before a rescue crew arrived. He said he didn’t think Arnone would ever go back to work.

“When he rolled over and I saw him that day, I got chills all over my body,” the tattoo artist said. “I thought he was dead.”

But one of Arnone’s co-workers at Funders Mortgage Corp. said she had little doubt he would survive.

“When this happened, I thought to myself that this is one of the most honest, loyal people and this is not the way this man is going to end his life,” said Nancy Klomp, a loan processor.