Hail in Mercer County, North Dakota

A round of upper level short wave troughs passed from eastern Montana and Saskatchewan into North Dakota during the late afternoon and early evening hours. This led to thunderstorm development in an environment of strong deep layer shear and elevated instability, with multiple supercells occurring. These storms produced very large hail and damaging wind gusts as the storms spread to the southeast. Two storms produced significant damage. The first one produced wind gusts of 80 mph to the northeast of Drake, McHenry County, which combined with ping pong ball size hail to cause extensive damage to crops and property. The second occurred to the south-southeast of Cleveland in which 3.5 inch diameter hail combined with high winds to severely damage two houses and crops in the area.