Colorado has been hit by hailstones the size of golf balls
Windshields have been smashed across the state.
As it’s now the month of May, the northern hemisphere is gearing up for sunnier days. But not so fast: spare a thought for the poor people of Colorado, who yesterday were hit by a mega hailstorm.
And these hailstones really weren’t messing about – check out the size of these bad boys.
The largest hailstone reported by the National Weather Service was a whopping 2.75 inches in diameter.
Everybody seemed to have the same idea: to hold the huge hailstones in their hands to give a sense of scale. This is definitely smart thinking, but how cold would their hands have got?
According to the Met Office: “Hail is solid precipitation in the form of balls or pieces of ice known as hailstones.” Unlike snow, the way they are formed in cumulonimbus clouds means that they don’t have time to melt before they reach the ground.
Here is the ground of the major league baseball team the Colorado Rockies. Nope, it’s not snow carpeting the field: that’s hail. Chances are they weren’t practising outside yesterday.
Rather than just being an annoyance that calls off play, the hailstorm has actually proved to be destructive. Helpless cars left outside were in great danger of having their windscreens smashed – undoubtedly an unwelcome surprise for drivers.
This car suffered even worse – the window was okay, but the body of the car couldn’t say the same.
Luckily, no injuries were reported and the storm has since abated.
