Staggering photos showed the gruesome aftermath of a Utah driver’s 2021 Ford F-150 Hybrid pickup truck after it was struck by lightning as he drove down a highway.

Casey Pettus was traveling northbound on Interstate 15 from St. George to Cedar City around 12.30pm Wednesday when the incident happened around milepost 50 during a heavy storm, according to the Utah Highway Patrol (UHP).

Pettus said he had just discovered that his rear driver’s side tire had blown out and was leaking air.

He was hoping to reach an exit in Cedar City to have the tire repaired when lightning suddenly struck.

‘It was so fast,’ Pettus told KSL. ‘It took a second or two seconds to register, but it went through the truck, it went through me — not that I felt the lightning or anything.’

‘It’s just the jolt was so intense, and it felt like it just pressured me down,’ he added. ‘And then I was like, “Holy cow, I just got struck by lightning.”‘

One photo showed flames emerging from the truck as a massive plume of black smoke went into the air.

Another photo revealed that the truck’s front half was nearly incinerated after it became fully engulfed within roughly five minutes. The UHP said the truck was a complete loss.

Utah contractor Casey Pettus’ 2021 Ford F-150 burst into flames after being struck by lightning while traveling on Interstate 15 from St. George to Cedar City around 12.30pm Wednesday

A photo of the aftermath of the incident showed how Pettus’ vehicle, which became fully engulfed within about five minutes, had effectively lost its entire front half after the huge blaze

Pettus, a contractor, explained that he was traveling to Cedar City during a ‘downpour’ to bid on a possible remodel on a home that had been listed for sale by a friend.

The lightning caused Pettus’ truck to shut down, so he was forced to ‘muscle’ his steering wheel to get off the road.

Once he was safe, Pettus recalled the drivers behind him being ‘jaw-dropped’ by what had just happened.

‘It didn’t feel like I hit anything, but just like my whole truck got hit and then, you know, a big flash of light,’ Pettus told KSL.

Pettus grabbed his phone and wallet once smoke began entering the cab of his truck.

However, he left his tools in the cab, and they did not survive the astonishing blaze.

‘It’s still even hard for me to comprehend that this even happened, right?’ Pettus said to the outlet.

He explained that he felt ‘calm and composed’ the whole time, but also ‘helpless.’

‘Your truck is starting to catch fire from the inside,’ Pettus said. ‘What do you do?’

Despite the astonishing photos of Pettus’ truck, he was unharmed. However, he said that he left all of his tools in the vehicle, and they were all lost in the fire

Pettus said he felt an intense jolt that ‘pressured [him] down,’ as he realized that he had been struck by lightning

Pettus said the lightning strike was ‘super crazy,’ but that he felt blessed and lucky to be unharmed and alive.

He is now dealing with his insurance company over what happened to his truck.

UHP Cpl Justin Faust said that the intensity of the fire raging inside the lightning-struck truck was a ‘weird scene to see.’

In the case of lightning storms, Faust suggested that drivers could pull under an overpass, get off the highway and look for some cover.

‘That’s the unsettling part about Mother Nature being unpredictable,’ he told the outlet.

Towing company Ladd’s Towing, from nearby Kanarraville, responded to remove the burnt vehicle from the road.

Tow truck operator Mark Hodgins, who responded to the incident, said Pettus was ‘understandably shaken up.’

‘He lost his truck, and he had quite a bit of expensive tools in it that he lost,’ Hodgins told KSL.

Hodgins added that it was the first time in his eight years of towing that he experienced a truck struck by lightning.

Pettus said he felt ‘helpless’ during the incident, but that he also stayed ‘calm and composed’ as he saw his vehicle start to catch fire from the inside

There were no other vehicles involved, UHP Lt Zach Randall told St. George News.

However, the truck caused northbound traffic to be delayed and both lanes were also briefly shut down.

The scene was cleared by around 5pm local time, according to the outlet.

The Daily Mail has reached out to Pettus, the UHP and Ladd’s Towing for further comment.