The Brightest Claim We Ever Lost

From “The Pit of Despair” to a Friendship That Still Shines | Fr. David & Team

(Based on a True Story from Rome Public Adjusting)

Eleanor Thompson is a widow with a laugh that could light up a cathedral. She raised three kids on love and backyard cannonballs. That old steel-wall vinyl-liner pool (installed by her late husband fifteen years ago) was the place where grandbabies were baptized, Fourth-of-July fireworks reflected on the water, and every summer ended with ice-cream drips on the deck.

Then came the night of May 20, 2025. A storm like Judgment Day rolled over Rome, Georgia. A tree exploded in white fire. Windows shook. And in the exact same heartbeat, the entire west wall caved inward with a roar that sounded like the sky itself had fallen.

Eleanor stood on the deck in her nightgown, stunned. From that night on, she nicknamed the ruined hole “The Pit of Despair.”

A respected local engineer inspected a month later and delivered a signed report: “Most likely caused by a lightning strike.” He circled dark streaks on the steel as “visible burn marks and localized scorching.” Hope blazed again.

We took the case and chased lightning with everything we had.

Six months. No stone unturned.

• Years of satellite imagery

• Water-bill forensics and refill records (there were none)

• Algae-growth timelines on the liner

• National Lightning Detection Network data

• Ground Potential Rise calculations

• Sonic-boom overpressure research

• A second lightning-forensics investigator with thirty years of experience

• Joint inspections in the Georgia heat

• Before-and-after photos of the “scorching” that literally washed away and turned bright white again

• Deep study of Georgia’s Efficient Proximate Cause law

  
  

The truth, when it finally broke through, was painful but pure: The pool had been nearly empty for nine long months. The dark streaks were ordinary red-clay leachate that darkens when wet and washes white with sun and rain. There was no fulgurite, no dime-sized hole, no melted metal, no orange liner staining—nothing lightning leaves behind.

This was a classic low-water / hydrostatic collapse—an excluded loss.

We withdrew the claim with a personal letter of apology, waived our entire fee on any goodwill payment, and asked the carrier to consider a small ex-gratia check out of simple kindness.

The policy did not pay.

But Eleanor wrote back:

“No worries. Such is the way it goes. No pool is no tragedy in the scheme of life. Thank you for all your work on behalf of The Pit of Despair and myself. All is well—have a very Happy Thanksgiving with your people! Enjoyed your humor and ability to balance what you do professionally with my snarkastic approach to life.”

And that, friends, is the victory that still lights up the room.

Sometimes the win is not a check. It is a widow who can laugh again and call her ruined pool “The Pit of Despair” with a wink instead of tears. It is a carrier who remembers there are still people of honor on the other side of the table. It is an engineer who grows wiser because someone loved him enough to tell him the truth without crushing him.

That is the Rome Public Adjusting promise:

We will chase lightning across the red clay of Georgia if that is where hope leads. We will leave no stone unturned, no question unasked, no possibility unexplored. And when the lightning turns out to be clay, we will stand with you in the truth—and still fight for every last drop of mercy heaven and earth can give.

Because at the end of the day, we don’t work for payouts. We work for people.

If you ever have a claim—even one that ends up in “The Pit of Despair”—call us. We will leave no stone unturned—so you never have to wonder.

Fr. David & the Rome Public Adjusting family

Chasing lightning. Finding truth. Delivering mercy.