HAILSTORM JULY 29, 2010

On Thursday afternoon, July 29, 2010 at  about 3 p.m. the sky turned dark, the wind started to blow, and  at first it was just a torrential  rainstorm,  and then it turned into small hail that just kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger! Marlee and I ran to the basement, Maggie had already hid somewhere, I was afraid all the windows were going to get broken out. The pounding  was relentless, and  by the time it quit, the power was out . When I opened the front door and looked outside, the ground was  covered with  broken pine tree branches, pine cones, and hail.....lots of it!!

The cover on the back deck was in shambles, the gutters were overflowing and bent from all the water, hail and debris. 

Darrell called right before the storm hit asking how it was out our way, while I was talking to him it started hailing, I told him to call back, when he did, after the storm, I asked him to come home. He said he would, and started home only to be delayed by a several accidents. He said there were between 50-75 cars along Highway 16 with their windows all broken out!

After taking a look at the size of the hail stones I wasn't surprised! The biggest hail I have ever seen or ever hope to see again!

And if all the outside damage wasn't enough, then the roof started to leak! There was water coming out of the light fixture in the kitchen and a leak in the living room ceiling . Darrell crawled up on the roof and realized all the vents were broken and the hail stones had actually gone through the shingles and plywood! He put tarps up to cover the holes and the leaks stopped! Thank Goodness! He was soaking wet when he came in and put in a call to American Family Insurance and told them what had happened.  American Family called the next morning to say an adjuster would be contacting us sometime this weekend to come out and look at the damage. They both called on Sunday (camper and house) and we made appointments for Tuesday morning. The house damage came to $15,500 and the camper was totaled, which saddened me.

                                 

The camper had been in another hail storm with us in 2000 and we fixed her up and have used her all this time, but this was too much for her and she was headed to a salvage yard, she deserved better than that!!

Darrell and I worked all weekend cleaning up the debris out of the yard and probably only got half done. I started in Monday morning on my own and do a little bit every day and I'm still not done.

The hail actually made holes in the ground where they hit! I saved some of the hail stones and have shown a few people and it's hard to believe that hail actually is that big! I'd say the bigger ones were larger than a baseball and not quite a softball.

                                

We were fortunate to have good insurance and a wonderful Insurance Company and wonderful adjusters! It will take a lot of work, but we will have everything back the way it was.