Impressive Hail Storm

Large hail is uncommon for our area.  Receiving significant amounts of hail is too.  That changed today reminding us how quickly weather can change.

Slightly before 4 p.m. a strong and powerful supercell formed and moved through Reading.  What it lacked in size it made up for intensity.  At the time I wasn't following the radar.  I didn't need to where I was at.  It was only after I happened to check my phone that the news started coming in about the hail storm.  Soon half the office was gathered around radar maps and checking phones for the latest images. 

Car windows were broken.  Highways were at a standstill because of the damage to cars.  People were holding up pieces of hail bigger than golf balls.  There are hundreds of pictures out there so I'm not going to go through all of them.  For records I am going to post a few to remember this event.

This photo was widely circulated of a motorist pulled off to the side of the road with clear damage to the windshield and hood.

From Twitter User Ashley Reed:  The Wyomissing area was hit particularly hard which contains much of the shopping areas for Reading.  Wyomissing and West Reading saw the most damage to cars and businesses.

When I left work I wondered how long it would take before I would start to see signs of the storm.  It was so small in size that I knew it would be a matter of a mile or two between nothing and something.  It wasn't until I got to Route 61 that I started to notice large piles of leaves on the ground.  It was the first sign that hail fell on the area.  As I turned into the complex under every tree was a pile of leaves.  I pulled into my parking spot and noticed the ground looked odd.  Well after an hour had past and the signs were still there.

 

This is what was left all over the ground even though the temperature was in the 70's.  I have no idea how long it was sitting there, how much accumulated or how big they were.  No cars in the parking area were dented outside of one that I assumed came from somewhere else before parking.  Got lucky.

Luckily when I went to the gym the TV was already turned to ABC 6, the station I normally watch.  Obviously the coverage would center on the hail storm.  When Cecily Tynan came on the first thing she mentioned was that in the 19 years she has been with the channel in Philadelphia she has never seen anything like it.  When the ABC Nightly News came on at 6:30 the very first story they had on the national news was the hail storm and this picture.

 

I can't say I would have liked to have witnessed this but at the same time I would have liked to witness this somewhere safe.  This storm came in so fast that nobody would have been prepared.  It also makes you think about weather far worse than this event.  This type of day is exactly the same as what people in the south and midwest experience before a tornado.  It was sunny outside.  There was no sign of bad weather approaching even at two in the afternoon.  Two hours later and hundreds or maybe thousands of cars suffered major damage.  Wyomissing just happened to be the spot today.  It could have been where I lived or worked.  It could have been my car.  And this was only a hail storm.  Nobody lost a house or family members or all possessions. 

Weather is unpredictable.  Almost anything can happen at any time in any place.  We are actually all lucky because many times cells like this produce tornadoes.  Going through a heavily populated area would have been bad.  With the severe season beginning as well as hurricane season on June 1st, things are only going to get more interesting.  Word on the street says the thinking this year is hurricanes will trend further north than normal with the hot spot being between North Carolina and New Jersey.  Let's bring back winter.

Speaking of winter I'm pretty sure that the snow is officially over which means I must post a year-end recap.  Thankfully I did not see or hear one person say sleet today.  Not sure it means anything though as most people still don't understand the difference.  The next post will be my winter recap before dare I say I do a first time hurricane prediction this year.  Why not.

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