Commercial Fixed Wing
Maintenance Airframe; Maintenance Powerplant
Situational Awareness; Communication Breakdown
Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Published Material / Policy; Inflight Event / Encounter Weather / Turbulence
Human Factors; Procedure; Weather
I was sitting in the tug; while awaiting push back clearance; the ramp manager came out to the tug to say he was taking his wing walkers and waived them inside. He never said why or if I was in danger. When I saw no one else on the ramp I went inside to operations and realized that the ramp had been closed due to lightning. I was never told while out on the ramp. While in operations we saw many flashes of lightning that sounded like they were right on top of us. The thunder was so loud you could feel it. We then heard over operations radio a [company] tug had been hit by lightning on Bravo and Quebec from our other tug crew that was right behind them on Bravo.After getting at least 30 lightning strikes within 3 miles of the airport; operations informed us the ramp was now open again. we got clearance from Ground Control and started our push; half way off the gate pushing the plane I heard what sounded like yelling; I turned around to see this wild crazy man running chasing us waiving his hands up in the air from the terminal. The operations guy was screaming that they needed the airplane for another flight. I called Ground Control to cancel our push and towed the plane back on the gate. With all the stress and confusion I missed the [aircraft] stop line; I called upstairs to my brake rider to release the brakes and the aircraft begin to roll a little; I called her back to set the brakes and at the same time the ramper put the chokes behind the nose wheel. The aircraft stopped right on the [aircraft] stop line. More lightning was approaching and we went into operations to wait until it was safe to put the jet bridge up. When I came into work the following day my supervisor asked me what happened.The stress of the lightning and thunder and being yelled at by the operations agent left me so confused that the tug cradle was open. I was trying to do my best under extremely stressful circumstances and extremely inclement weather. There was also confusion about what to do during lightning; I never received 10 mile warnings or 3 mile warnings or was told the ramp was closed. I had to seek out information instead of being informed by any sort of lightning or weather warning system.Tech operations management needs to have a severe weather plan in place prior to a lightning event. Using two people in the cab of the tug would also help with redundant procedures during times of off schedule operations and unexpected occurrences. Currently management only allows us one person in the cab of the tug to work the radio and drive the tug causing workload overload during stressful times.
A Maintenance Technician reported that while getting ready to tow an aircraft he was not informed the ramp was closed because of lightning strikes in the area.