Last week's hailstorm

Last Wednesday night around midnight an impressive hailstorm blew through Austin from the west. It also had lightning, thunder, and high winds. I'm lucky not to have west windows, but the sideways hail did a lot of damage elsewhere. I found several hailstones that measured 2 inches across.

According to the newspaper, trees were down all over town; some landed on houses. The state Capitol grounds lost eight big old trees. I saw some of that damage from the bus today; if I get over there with my camera before it's all cleaned up I'll post a pic or two.

My neighborhood seems to have escaped the worst of it. A lot of branches came down, and one landed on the car in the picture at right. Nearly every west-facing window lost some glass. Two-inch hail does a lot of damage when it's being driven by tree-felling winds.

The impressive fallen tree below blocked a busy street for hours Thursday before the city crews could get the offending branches cut away and cleared. Removing the rest of it will be quite a chore for whoever owns that house.