Hail in Knott County, Kentucky

Picture on social media showed approximately golf ball-sized (1.75 inch) hail south of Fisty.

The most widespread severe thunderstorm activity in many months broke out across eastern Kentucky on Tuesday, May 16th. A warm front lifted to near the Mountain Parkway during the morning hours, ushering in a muggy airmass for those locations to the south of the Parkway. Sun shining on this juicy air mass helped build up moderate amounts of instability south of the warm front as temperatures warmed into the upper 70s to mid 80s there. Meanwhile, persistent cloud cover and a weak northeasterly breeze north of the front kept temperatures cooler and conditions much more stable. A wave of low pressure rode along the stalled warm front during this afternoon, triggering supercell storms in the area between the warm front and the Hal Rogers Parkway/KY-80 corridor. These storms dropped severe to significant-sized hail. One of the supercells also produced a brief tornado in Magoffin County southwest of Salyersville. Further south, weaker shear led to less organized storm structures, but even there the storms still generated strong outflows leading to bowing storm lines and damaging wind gusts.