BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) - Mixing lightning and boats is a recipe for tragedy. Every experienced boater and fisherman knows that.

But the lightning-strike death of a fisherman on Canyon Ferry Reservoir last Friday still shook up many experienced boaters for the swift, random, gruesome violence that can take place when lightning strikes a boat.

Theodore Raymond Austin III, 50, of Helena, was the victim of the tragedy as he fished near the earthen dikes on the southeast shore of the lake at about 3:20 p.m. Friday. He is a native of Minot, N.D.

Walleye fishermen had been flocking to Canyon Ferry in recent weeks from across Montana, fueled by reports of a great bite on the south end of the lake.

By all accounts, the weather in the area was odd last Friday and Saturday. It simply didn't look bad with a generally cloudy sky with a few slightly darker clouds mixed among them rolling over the Elkhorn Mountains.

U.S. District Judge Jack Shanstrom, of Billings, was among the fishermen taking advantage of the good walleye bite as he fished with Earl Kunn and George Galuska.

"It was a pretty decent day," Shanstrom recalled. "There were a little bit of clouds in the west, then a little bit of rain coming down. I looked at it in the west and you could see through it. There wasn't much rain there.

"I saw a bolt of lightning come down between the mountains and the lake," he said. "That was the first sign of anything."

According to Brenda Ludwig, the Broadwater County sheriff and coroner, Austin, who was fishing alone, had just caught a walleye at about that time.

Shanstrom said, "Within a minute, there was a huge bang of lightning on the lake. There was nothing you could do. We got ready to leave. Then there was another flash of lightning and it almost knocked us out of the boat.

"It was so loud, it rocked you," he said. "I thought it might have hit us. It really, really crashed. I looked around, and there was smoke coming out of the boat next to us. We were about 100 feet away. We were the closest one to it.

"People were yelling that he's been hit," Shanstrom said. "There were probably about 75 boats within 200 yards of him when it happened.

"The boat next to us took off and went over there and said the guy is on fire. Get a fire extinguisher," he said. "They had to put him out with a fire extinguisher. He was dead. It was horrible. There wasn't anything we could do."

Ludwig said, "One of the boaters near Austin saw it happen and called it in. We responded to the docks by the Silos. Another fisherman towed him in.

"That afternoon, there was quite a little bit of lightning afterward," she added. "A lot of the other boaters who were down the lake knew something was up so they came in. Pretty much all the boats cleared off the lake."

Austin was running a fiberglass boat. Ludwig said, "The lightning exited out the opposite side of the boat from where he was at. There was a burn mark where it came out. It made a hole through the fiberglass.

"It was just a tragedy," she added.

For Shanstrom, like other fishermen out on Canyon Ferry that day, it was a stern lesson on lightning and how quickly and unexpectedly a weather situation can turn dangerous.

"There was no warning for you to get off the lake," Shanstrom said. "Anyone who would have tried to get off the lake wouldn't have been able to get off the lake quickly enough. It was really spooky.

"A friend of mine in Helena told me that if you see any clouds coming over those mountains, get out of there," he said. "I'm 74 years old. I've been fishing for 70 years.

"I've seen lightning storms. But I never had a lesson in lightning like this one," Shanstrom said. "It makes me think about all the other times I've been out on lakes and seen lightning in the distance. It makes me wonder what could have happened all those times."