If the forecast is correct

[ProudUte]

Our game tomorrow will be delayed.  Utah State has already been delayed tonight.  I hate these delays.  These never happened 20-30 years ago.  I guess it’s the safe thing to do, but I still hate them.  They are very disruptive to the continuity of the game.

[Jesse]

If the game is delayed too long into Sunday morning, will BYU still play?

[UteFanatic]

Yes, it’s happened before I believe.

[ProudUte]

Utah State game was delayed 90 minutes.  Some of that was due to the fact that they lost power.

[PlainsUte]

It was Utah State, so maybe the squirrel running the generator got scared.

[SOWhat]

They didn’t happen 20-30 years ago? They happened, I’m sure you know they didn’t have the protocols we have now. I had a HS game that was canceled because of lightning.

[ProudUte]

I honestly do not remember one Utah game delayed because of thunderstorms prior to 2000.  It may have happened, but I just don’t remember.  (But I am getting old.)  AND yes the protocols have changed as they probably should.  I just don’t like long delays in the game.

[dystopiamembrane]

Would you please be more specific?

[Charlie]

I am wondering if this practice came from a specific event. I get that we can be struck and it is a possibility. I am simply trying to understand the incremental difference in risk with people headed to cars etc. like at the HS game tonight. No doubt fishermen come in off the lake when they see lightning. So without challenging the practice, I am just wondering about the math as people scatter to god knows where in a stadium to crowd together in cover during COVID to reduce risk by how much?

[Central Coast Ute]

Good question. You’re more likely to catch covid than get struck by lightning even out there would be my guess. But I’m sure chances of death are higher with the lightning strike. But if the chances of being struck are so low, it might mathematically be better to wait it out in the rain.

[GameForAnyFuss]

You’re right – it’s the old “low probability of a high risk outcome vs. high probability of a low risk outcome” debate.

Also, optics come in to play. If a person gets COVID at a football game and dies, they won’t die for at least a week, and you can’t be totally certain they caught it at the game. But if a person gets hit by lightning at a football game and dies? The death is probably immediate and it’s obvious where it happened.

Lightning strikes are the kind of preventable deaths that cause politicians and the public to ask questions. Sadly when someone dies of COVID, most politicians and the public don’t give a crap.

[Central Coast Ute]

True. And with a covid death, it would be hard to prove that person actually contracted it at the football game and not at work at the store or somewhere else.

[SOWhat]

I just checked my weather app, 16% chance of rain. However, we all know that it’s lightning that’s the problem. I believe that 10 miles is the cutoff point, per NCAA.

[Author]

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