What is the largest hail you've ever experienced?

1. 39

   ChristinSposted 9 years ago

   What is the largest hail you've ever experienced?
   
   South of me today they are having intense storms with softball sized hail (4.5 inches yikes!)  I have seen baseball sized hail once in my 41 years and it was slushy and didn't do as much damage as one would expect, but it was absolutely terrifying when it was coming down.    How can hail get that large?

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2. 95

   lisavollrathposted 9 years ago

   About the size of my fist. Do you remember that episode of WKRP where Les Nessman threw frozen turkeys out of a helicopter? That's sort of what hail that size sounds like when it hits the roof. Pretty much the whole neighborhood got new roofs after that storm.

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   1. 39

      ChristinSposted 9 years agoin reply to this

      lol yikes I  can only imagine. I know the baseball sized stuff was loud and I thought who threw something at my house? They banged loudly, but were slushy so some dents to the siding but no new roof and I needed one too lol.

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3. 84

   tsmogposted 9 years ago

   hmmmm . . . causes one to wonder if there is an iceberg floating around doesn't it. The largest I have experienced was not quite golf ball lasting in a torrent for say five minutes or more. It was probably near to 2PM or 3. The hail sounded like the end of popcorn popping as it diminished ending with oddly seemingly sparse rain, which was much more gentle. The street was flooded pretty quickly with water. The back garden looked as white as snow as it fell.
   
   I live in a mobile home and the roof is a composite while the carport and front porch awning is aluminum. It was harrowing listening to it, though watching it wasn't as threatening. Definitely the TV was drown by the pounding hail. Imagine a Karn Evil 9 Drum solo amplified passed your max for the stereo.
   
   The freaky part was the sky becoming horrifically pitch dark so quickly. I would describe it like there was a vacuum of sorts sucking the sky toward the barren earth, the sky became darkened toward night, and the clouds seemed like they were at the edge of light as if you could reach up and touch darkness unlike that of night time where it seems more elusive. This was like . .  . wow . . . the sky 'is' falling.

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   1. 39

      ChristinSposted 9 years agoin reply to this

      Where we live we get hail storms like this fairly often - and your description is right on the money the sky is falling - that precip gets so heavy it makes the skies black as night - scary and fascinating at the same time.

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4. 62

   LoisRyan13903posted 9 years ago

   !998 I saw hail the size of golf balls.We had a tornado in the area which touched down about a mile from us-we don't get many tornadoes by us- and wasn't on the ground for too long.  It was already in the sky when the storm passed over us.  Pretty scary-not really because of the hail but the way the thunder kept crashing and soon an the lightning flashed-and also how the sky was pitch black in the middle of the day.  The hail itself was a relief meaning the storm had passed by.  I think the hail left some small dents on the roof and hood of the car.

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   1. 39

      ChristinSposted 9 years agoin reply to this

      Hail often accompanies tornadoes so no surprise. I live in Southern Illinois so no stranger to those scary storms either! Hail is scary for sure and it can do a lot of damage quickly.

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   2. 62

      LoisRyan13903posted 9 years agoin reply to this

      We have a tornado warning maybe once or twice a year, most times it ends up being nothing-mainly the thunderstorms capable of producing tornadoes.  Summer of 98 was crazy with weather-El Nino

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5. 59

   Matt Easterbrook5posted 9 years ago

   While visiting Utah one time the hail was so large it was putting dents on the hood of the car while driving.

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