Severe Thunderstorms across the area including at my location.

Hail covering our yard May 5Th

Severe Thunderstorms broke out across the area today, Which caught me totally off guard. First I'll talk about the storm that effected me, one isolated Storm became severe started producing nickel sized hail in Northern St Croix County in Star Prairie. The NWS in the Twin Cities issued a warning for quarter sized hail just before it hit Star Prairie. I was watching it on radar as it continued to drift Northeast. for a time the NWS radar was detecting some weak rotation in the storm just before it hit Clayton. I thought I could see clouds lowing to southwest of my location. but nothing dangerous Then after awhile Hail started to fall. it first was nickel sized, but then started to reach to the size of quarters. During this time it was almost all hail which was falling with not much rain.

Hailstones that I picked up to show the size Note the hail did melt some.

Hail kept coming in waves it seemed like. after awhile the ground became totally white with hail Which could even be seen by my live camera. This storm also bought lots of cloud to cloud lightning, it seemed like the thunder never slowed down. The temperature really dropped during this storm, we started off at 62 before the storm and right after we cooled to 52.F! Now I will talk about other areas effected by this storm. Shortly after producing Quarter sized hail at my house it continue east and produced nicked sized hail which also covered the ground in areas north of Prairie Farm, After that the storm weakened, There are no more reports from that storm at this time. Now I will talk about the storm which effected north Polk County and Southern Burnett county. This storm formed right in northern Polk county The storm became strong near Milltown but did not start producing severe hail until it reached Lewis. Where quarter sized hail was reported penny sized hail was reported southwest of Siren from the same storm, after that it continue northeast but weakened.

The Damage

Daffodils all shredded from the Hail May 5Th.

a closer look at the shredded daffodils

This storm brought the most hail I had ever seen, I really have to say I never seen so much hail from one storm. The nickel to 1 inch hail was devastating on the spring blooming flowers in my garden. You can see the petals shredded off laying on the ground below the plants. You could also smell the strong sent of pine after the hail ended because of the hail damaging some of the needels.

The unopened tulips really took a hard hit from the hail! One of the tulips I saw was even completely cut off the plant! I should still see some flowers when they open.

Here is a photo of the fog after the storm pasted. Right after the storm we broke out into sunshine which would explain the fog forming from the cold hail in the ground! the white spots are hail piles!
One last photo of This Huge pile nearly 1 foot deep! hail pile really amazed me when I found it! The hail and heavy rain brought the hail off the roof and out the gutter this is what caused this to pile up here it really looks like snow!

Here is one video of the hail that fell at my house. You can clearly see the hail bounceing off the yard, I added a note in the video to show where one of the bigger hailstones landed. This was after the heaviest hail core. for another good video during a heavier hail core please go Here

Reports

St Croix County Star Prairie 0.88 inch hail

Polk County Clayton 1.00 inch hail " hail covering the ground lots of quarter sized hailstones"

Barron County 3 N Prairie Farm 0.88 inch hail " Sheriff Deputy reported pea to nickel sized hail covering the ground"

Polk County Lewis 1.00 inch hail "about quarter sized hail but most were smaller"

Burnett County 4 SW Siren 0.75 inch hail