Dr. Tony Cicoria: A Surgeon Struck by Lightning Enters a River of Love

Medical Details

In August 1994, at age 42, he was struck in the face by lightning that came through a pay phone at a pavilion at Sleepy Hollow Lake in Athens, New York. A nurse who was waiting to use the phone performed CPR. He had burns on his mouth and on his foot where the current exited. He declined an ambulance and was later checked by his cardiologist and neurologist.

The Experience

In August 1994, Tony Cicoria, a 42-year-old orthopedic surgeon, was running the grill at a family birthday gathering at Sleepy Hollow Lake in Athens, New York. He stepped away to call his mother from a pay phone, not noticing the dark cloud gathering over the lake. As he hung up, he heard a huge crack, and a flash of light came out of the phone and struck him in the face, throwing him backward.

As he flew back, he says, he had the strange sensation of moving forward. Then he was standing there, looking at the dangling phone, completely clear-headed but confused. His mother-in-law came running down the stairs straight toward him, as if she couldn't see him, and ran past. Turning to follow her, he saw his own body on the ground with people gathered around it. "Oh my God, I'm dead," he realized. He felt a little disappointed that there were no bells or whistles. Above all, he understood that his consciousness was continuing without any break: we die, he says, but we don't cease.

No one could see or hear him. A woman who had been waiting with her daughter to use the phone turned out to be a nurse, and he watched her kneel to begin CPR. Wanting to see his family, he started up the stairs and noticed his legs dissolving; by the top he was just a ball of energy. He passed through the wall and found himself directly above his wife, who was painting children's faces. Looking at her and his children, he sensed they would be fine, and he kept moving, as if on a conveyor belt.

When he passed through the roof, he says, it was as if he had fallen into a river of pure positive energy, a bright bluish-white light radiating from a distant source. It reminded him of lying at the bottom of a clear creek as a boy, watching sunlight sparkle through the water. The light was absolute love and peace. He could see and feel the energy forming everything, trees and hillsides, like a gentle vibration running through all of it, and he thought, this must be the God energy. A collage of high and low moments from his life flashed by, each carrying its own knowing. He was moving somewhere with speed and direction, and he was ecstatic.

Then, as if a switch were flipped, he was back in his body, pleading inwardly, "Please don't make me do this. I don't want to go back." He went from bliss to pain. When he opened his eyes, he tried to thank the nurse, but all that came out was, "It's okay, I'm a doctor." She laughed and said, "Well, you weren't a minute ago."

How It Changed Their Life

He says the experience showed him that consciousness continues without a break, and that whoever we are, we always are. He describes it as the greatest thing that could ever happen to somebody.