Excerpts from WUSA9.com/AP story:
A six-story-tall statue of Jesus Christ with his arms raised along a highway was struck by lightning in a thunderstorm Monday night and burned to the ground, police said.
The “King of Kings” statue, one of southwest Ohio’s most familiar landmarks, had stood since 2004 at the evangelical Solid Rock Church along Interstate 75 in Monroe, just north of Cincinnati.
The lightning strike set the statue ablaze around 11:15 p.m., Monroe police dispatchers said.
The sculpture, 62 feet tall and 40 feet wide at the base, showed Jesus from the torso up and was nicknamed Touchdown Jesus because of the way the arms were raised, similar to a referee signaling a touchdown. It was made of plastic foam and fiberglass over a steel frame, which is all that remained early Tuesday.
The fire spread from the statue to an adjacent amphitheater but was confined to the attic area, and no one was injured, police Chief Mark Neu said. The fire department would release a monetary damage estimate Tuesday, he said.
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As usual, Dave, you beat me to this one… One thing I heard from the BBC report on PRI was that insurance companies had termed this incident as -you guessed it- “an act of God.”
This statue was also known a “Football Jesus” due to the outstretched arms similar to a referee signaling a touchdown. It was a shrine that many Notre Dame football fans went to before a Notre Lame football game, to pray not to be embarassed once again on national television. Alas their prayers usually went unanswered and the Notre Lame faithful usually went home disgusted and humiliated, but preaching to anyone who will listen of great wins from the 1940′s and 1950′s. Who will they pray to now?
Actually, Pete… Notre Dame’s “Touchdown Jesus” is a mural on the outside of the campus library, which can be seen from inside Notre Dame Stadium. It was installed in the 1960s — a few years before the sculpture in Ohio.
How was this called dispatched? “Jesus burning”? “Holy Fire”? “Crispy Christ”?
I would love to hear the audio of this call.
OIC: “Comm, on-scene, confirming working fire; alpha and bravo sides, from head to toe.”
This statue was off of I-75 in Ohio, midway between Cinci and Dayton near Trader’s World. It had many names; touchdown Jesus (not football Jesus), drowning Jesus, Quicksand Jesus, Big Butter Jesus. Now, and quiet appropriately, it is being called Terminator Jesus due to the synthetic outer tissue melting off to reveal a metal endoskeleton. God held us if it becomes self aware.
For those not familiar comedian Heywood Banks wrote a song about this statue entitled “Big Butter Jesus”. For a good laugh listen at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lx6fxJS0pt0&feature=related