Record-breaking Hail in Colorado
By Amanda Schmidt, AccuWeather staff writer
A version of this article was first published on:
Monster hail fell from the sky and hammered areas of the central United States on Tuesday, shattering a state record. Earlier on Tuesday before the storms developed, AccuWeather Extreme Meteorologist Reed Timmer warned that Colorado’s state hail record could be in jeopardy given the intensity of the storms that he saw developing.
His prediction came to fruition on Tuesday afternoon when a hailstone with an unofficial measurement of a maximum diameter of 4.83 inches fell in Bethune, Colorado, on Tuesday afternoon. The record was confirmed on Wednesday evening by the Colorado Climate Center and the National Weather Service office in Goodland, Kansas. The previous state record in Colorado was 4.5 inches.
As the Colorado Climate Center said on Twitter, photos indicate that the stone could have been even larger than recorded due to the time in between its falling and when it was put in the freezer.
The weight of the record-breaking hailstone came in at 8.5 ounces.
@NWSBoulder @NWSGoodland I am verifying what looks to be a record setting hailstone for #cowx Am told this fell near Bethune this afternoon. Would easily beat the 4.5″ record… Given the way the radar looked, I wouldn’t be surprised. Stay tuned! pic.twitter.com/LiUazILn6r
— Brian Bledsoe (@BrianBledsoe) August 13, 2019
