hailstone

Imagine a summer thunderstorm turning fierce: suddenly, instead of raindrops, you're dodging little balls of ice. Those are hailstones. They are not snowflakes. They form inside strong thunderstorms, where drops of water get carried high into very cold air and freeze in layers.

They can be as small as peas or as big as golf balls, and sometimes even larger. A fall of them is called hail. Farmers worry about them damaging crops, and car owners dread the dents they can leave behind. Think of it as nature's icy surprise. You might read about hailstorms in weather reports or see pictures of roads, fields, and roofs covered in ice after a strong storm.

A hailstone is a form of solid precipitation: a ball or uneven lump of ice that forms inside cumulonimbus clouds, which are thunderstorm clouds. Unlike snowflakes, which are light and crystal-shaped, hailstones usually have layers, almost like an onion, built up as supercooled water freezes around a tiny center.

The process begins when strong updrafts in a thunderstorm carry raindrops high into very cold parts of the atmosphere. These drops freeze, then gather more liquid water, which also freezes when it hits the growing piece of ice. This cycle can repeat many times, adding layer after layer until the hailstone becomes too heavy for the updraft to hold up, and it falls to the ground.

Its size depends on how strong the storm's updrafts are and how much supercooled water is available. Smaller hailstones may be pea-sized or even smaller, while larger ones can be several inches across and cause serious damage.

Hailstorms are most common in spring and summer, when conditions often help strong thunderstorms grow. They are often mentioned in severe weather warnings that tell people to move indoors. You might see the word "hailstone" in news reports about extreme weather, in reports about crop damage, or in stories that describe dramatic storms, where people rush for cover as the ice crashes down around them.