Yes your Dad took hit instead of the calf. That is the strange thing about electricity. It is whatever farthermost away seems to always takes the hit first on power surges. In your Dad's case whatever closest to ground potential.
I once had a laptop modem to take a hit even it had to go thru my computer first when there was a lightning five away at the phone company's hub building. I was just checking after hours for the next day service calls and to upload daily reports. Good thing I had copy of the company's software on the home computer as it took a week to get it thru to my area's manager that I needed a new modem.
