A girl has been taken to hospital after being struck by lightning during a spectacular storm that swept through Melbourne this afternoon, causing widespread damage and stopping traffic.
The 17-year-old girl is recovering in the Monash Medical Centre in a stable condition following the strike outside her house at Rowville, in Melbourne's southeast, at about 3.30pm, an ambulance spokesman said.
The incident comes as the damage from storms that rolled in after 2.00pm continued to hamper people travelling home, with extensive delays to public transport and fallen trees obstructing drivers.
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A roof collapsed at a shopping plaza in Greensborough while a train was also hit by lightning at Sunshine.
More than 570 people had called emergency services for assistance by 4.30pm, a State Emergency Services spokeswoman said.
A spokeswoman for train operator Connex said the flash storm was creating delays and cancellations across all rail services.
"There's going to be major delays for the entire afternoon peak period because we have had severe damage caused to our infrastructure," she said.
Trees collapsed onto train lines and overheard wiring while at least one station had been flooded.
A train had been struck by lightning at Sunshine station but there were no immediate reports of injuries, she said.
The worst-affected areas were in the city's eastern suburbs, especially Nunawading and Eltham, with more than 170 calls coming from residents in those areas alone.
"Most of those calls have been in the last [half an hour] — they're coming in very fast," she said.
One witness told a Melbourne radio station wires were dangling from the roof of Greensborough Shopping Plaza as water gushed into the mall after a roof collapsed under the weight of the downpour.
But a spokeswoman for the centre told ninemsn the damage was minor and trading would continue as normal.
"It's about a 3m-square section of the roof that has been impacted — we're working to get it back safe and secure," she said.
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