Posted: 6/21/07
Massive hailstorm hits Stark-Harris area hard Wednesday evening
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Stark resident Pat Wortham's house sustained severe damage in the hailstorm Wednesday evening. Besides the damage outside, inside was filled with water and broken glass. Vehicles sustained broken windows, including Wortham's semi trailer parked in his yard. |
By MaryHelen Swanson
At 6 p.m., Wednesday, June 20, the sky over the Stark-Harris area in Chisago County was bright blue with a large cumulonimbus cloud forming overhead, its white, puffy mass boiling higher and higher into the sky.
About 45 minutes later, the folks in the area were reeling from the aftermath of a massive, damaging hail storm.
Ron Sjostrand, owner of the Pioneer Farm on CR 10 along Fish Lake, had barely made it home on his motorcycle. He had come from Harris where the sirens were sounding.
He had just gotten into a large metal pole building when the storm began.
Sjostrand said it was a "wall of hail" and it sounded like someone was hitting the side of the building with a sledge hammer. His wife was in the barn with the horses. There was significant damage to the buildings on the farm, including the home that was in the process of being painted. Vehicles, including his tractor were damaged by the "baseball-sized" hail stones. Fortunately, someone had wisely put valuable classic cars into a building just prior to the storm.
Further to the west, on Cedarcrest Trail north of CR 10, Gail Wortham had just got home and put some chicken on the grill.
Pat Wortham said it got real still and he knew that wasn't good. He had been watching the television report, but it did not include Chisago County, except for a brief break when they said if you were in the path, you should take cover.
Pat Wortham said he heard a few small hailstones and then the living room window broke.
They went to the basement immediately not sure what they would find when it was over.
What they found was a home severely damaged, glass and water all over inside the house from the broken windows and holes in the roof.
The hailstones, they said, were bigger than baseball size, and there were even some around at 7 a.m. Thursday morning.
The Worthams lost a duck and their horses broke through the fence.
Other than that, there were no injuries.
Thursday morning there was a thick carpet of pine branches covering their entire yard. Wortham was just about to make a trip with his semi, which now also had a broken windshield and their motorhome is destroyed.
Pat Wortham said at the height of the storm a woman pulled into his yard and parked her car under a tree in his yard. He said he tried to get her in the house but she couldn't leave the car, which sustained many broken windows.
On the east shores of Little Horseshoe Lake, Shelly Prokop watched the storm come across the lake in the same "wall" fashion other storm victims were describing.
Standing among four vehicles with leaves piled to her knees, she said she doesn't know where to begin.
She figured the storm lasted about 20 minutes. Like her neighbors, windows are smashed on her home, her yard, home and garage are blanketed in what looks like silage.
A cornfield just east of downtown Stark, owned by the Carlbooms was devastated, as well as bean fields in the area.
Immediately after the storm, the roads in the area were covered by inches of pulverized leaves.
Douglas Rogers reported to the Chisago County Sheriff Department that there were more than 10 dead geese from the hailstorm, and that his house, on 440th St. was badly damaged from the hail. He said a neighbor measured a hailstone at one and a quarter inch.
Many in the area apparently were tracking the weather Wednesday night, saying that they were watching television reports.
When the calm hit, non were expecting such a devastating hailstorm, although some said it could have been worse.
Early Thursday morning, roofing company signs sprang up in the Stark-Harris and area auto shops were being swamped with requests for vehicle repairs.
Many, like the Worthams, were fielding phone calls from friends and relatives as they waited for the insurance adjuster to arrive.
And neighbors were helping each other out.
By Steve Morris
At around 6:15 p.m Tuesday night, Tom Sundly was sitting in his basement watching the news when Mother Nature unleashed a furious hailstorm he will not soon forget.
Sundly's Harris home was pelted with baseball-size hail that smashed five windows and destroyed his siding and roof. One hailstone crashed through his window and landed at his feet in the basement.
After the storm passed, Sundly said he had an eight-inch high drift of hailstones on his garage door.
The house was badly damaged, but the Sundly family survived the storm with no injuries.
"It lasted about five minutes. It was like machine gun fire on the house," Sundly said.
He estimated the hail storm caused at least $10,000 in damage.
Mark Call, Sundly's neighbor to the south, also was hit hard by the storm. Call and his son had just pulled out of their driveway and were headed toward their church when the storm hit. They made it back to the safety of their house, but not without getting pelted with the hard hail.
Call's son Parker was hit in the back and shoulder on his way into the house and sprained his ankle. His injuries were not serious.
Like Sundly's house, Call's house had severe damage to the roof, siding and windows. He said five family cars were damaged by the hail.
He estimated the damage at $30,000.
"It sounded like a person was taking a baseball bat to the car," he said.
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