Hailstones the size of tennis balls hit south-central France (PHOTO, VIDEO)
A huge thunderstorm has bombarded the French region of Auvergne-Rhone-Alpes with hailstones the size of tennis balls, and included a record number of lightning bolts, providing for a deluge of impressive content on social media.
The meteorological calamity led to the classification by Meteo France of most of the country as being at the second-to-worst ‘level orange’ weather threat on Saturday. But Auvergne-Rhone-Alpes, located on the border with Switzerland and Italy, was hit the hardest.
One video captured a swimming pool that looked as though it was boiling, due to the massive hailstones falling into the water.
#Orages de grêle hier en #Auvergne Source : https://t.co/BuoiXd1EBTpic.twitter.com/DJ5uzxxekQ
— La Chaîne Météo (@lachainemeteo) July 7, 2019
There have been, so far, no reports of deaths of injuries caused by the hailstorms.
Encore de violentes chutes de #grele ce dimanche comme ici dans le #Gard Les #orages sont moins nombreux que la veille mais restent localement puissants (carte des échos maxis sur 3h).Photo : Bianca Frontier Selzer via météo Languedoc pic.twitter.com/znKVWf8NPQ
— meteo60 (@meteo60) July 7, 2019
The thunderstorm also set a record for the most lightning bolts striking this year, with 73,700 of them recorded, mainly over Auvergne-Rhone-Alpes.
#SaintEtienne encore de la grêle sur la ville ! En seulement deux semaines, trois orages de grêle ont frappés la ville et la métropole stéphanoise. Le climat devient fou ! 😟 pic.twitter.com/K1Y8wdQWTX
— John Mothe (@JonathanMothe) July 6, 2019
The French south had already witnessed a massive hailstorm in mid-June, in which 10 people were injured and serious damaged was meted out to property and to local vineyards.
Editor’s note: One of the tweets included in the story featured a video that was later shown to have come from Sydney, Australia and not France. That tweet has been removed.
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