Hail, Hail

Got stuck in a hail storm in Pennsylvania on Friday night. I hear what you're saying: "Bah!" you say. "Hail, schmail," you say. (Everyone in the room looks away nervously when you do.) But this was something else.

Things went well on Friday. I managed to get out of the office early for a change. Drove the 230+ miles to Pennsylvania by 6:30. Dinner was practically waiting for us and all was well. After dinner we headed off to the nearest sporting goods store (about 30 miles) so I could get a fishing license and some supplies. Things still going well.

On the way home all hell broke loose. We're driving on back country roads, about 9:00 at night. It's dark, raining lightly, about 59 degrees. Then came the hail. And we're not talking a little bit of hail either. We're talking machine-gun hail, for something like 7 minutes. (Please don't say "Hail, schmail," again. Please.)

I've been in some real storms before, including a few out on open water. (I spent 3 years on a ship in the Med.) I don't think I've ever seen anything quite like this. I know I can't even hope to try to convey the majesty of this storm, but here goes:

We pulled over to the side of the road because it was almost impossible to see. Pretty much every hail storm I'd ever seen started gradually -- Sort of ping, ping-ping, ping-ping-ping-ping-ping. Not this one. One test shot (whump! Yup. That'll do it.) Then it was like machine-gun fire -- wh-wh-wh-wh-wh-whump!!! Seven minutes of that. Nothing huge, no Texas-style softball-sized hail. Just lots and lots of small (say, marble sized?) ones coming really, really fast. The temperature dropped a whopping 9 degrees during that time. THAT, ladies and gentleman, is a cold front.

Fortunately for us none of the idiots who refused to pull over during the storm actually ran into us, though one guy did come close. What goes wrong in a person's head to make them think they can drive in that? Even after it stopped -- and five or ten miles down the road at that -- we were still seeing these little icy white ball bearings all over the road.

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For your further amusement... try to imagine 3 adults and a 12 year old in an extended cab pickup screaming at the top of their lungs to be heard from the front seat to the back. Now imagine the 12 year old holding up a paper cup to catch the water that's dripping in around the hole in the roof. (Another story, another time.) And all the while, little icy marbles fall from the sky and pummel eveything into submission. Truly awesome.

Posted by John at April 7, 2003 8:14 PM