Some parts of NJ were treated to a hailstorm on Friday

In some parts of the country, hailstorms are common enough to cause regular vehicle damage to cars. When I visited my daughter in Texas a couple of years ago, I saw golf ball size hail bang up some cars pretty good.

Friday, we got some hail in Burlington County all of a sudden out of nowhere. It started raining hard quickly and all of a sudden ice balls came down from the sky for about five minutes.

Most of them were the size of marbles and luckily there was no visible damage to the cars.

It seems unlikely that on an 80-degree day in May that ice pellets could fall from the sky. According to AccuWeather, "Hailstorms form in cumulonimbus clouds, giant clouds that often cause storms and cumulonimbus clouds are often present in summer storms. As these clouds rise high into the colder parts of the atmosphere, the water vapor inside them turns to ice crystals."

Hail is most common in our area during early summer when surface temperatures are warm enough to promote the instability associated with strong thunderstorms, but the upper atmosphere is still cool enough to support ice.

I've only seen both of those things a half a handful of times in my life, which was cool, but at dinnertime on a Friday night, I just wanted to get out for something to eat and drink!

Opinions expressed in the post above are those of New Jersey 101.5 talk show host Dennis Malloy only.

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