Golf- and tennis-ball-sized hail pummeled southeast Colorado Springs Thursday night, rendering 27 police cars inoperable with broken windshields and rear-view mirrors and severely battered hoods and trunks.
The big dent in the department’s fleet will not significantly affect operations that include providing security for a visit by presidential candidate Donald Trump to Colorado Springs on Friday, said Lt. Howard Black, Colorado Springs police spokesman.
“We had a tremendous hail storm. Obviously it’s going to have an impact. But it’s not going to have any impact on that detail,” Black said. “We’ll just move cars around from other divisions.”
Black said Colorado Springs divisions already moved unmarked police cars and patrol cars from other divisions into the south part of the city where most of the cars were damaged by the bad weather.
Large #hail, the size of golf balls fell this evening in Colorado Springs, #Colorado.
Video: Jessica Moore pic.twitter.com/XIblKfJIpc— WeatherNation (@WeatherNation) July 29, 2016
Hail from 1½ inches in diameter, roughly the size of a golf ball, to 2 ½ inches, fractionally smaller than a tennis ball, wreaked havoc in southeast Colorado Springs near Peterson Air Force Base, said Kyle Fredin, meteorologist for the National Weather Service in Boulder.
Please stay off the roads and indoors pic.twitter.com/YherQ9eczR
— CSFD PIO (@CSFDPIO) July 29, 2016
The “intense” hail storm struck around 9 p.m., Black said.
It damaged homes, cars, trees and stranded some residents by flash flooding, he said. Colorado Springs firefighters rescued several motorists stranded on flooded streets, he added.
“It’s incredible,” Black said.
The storm shattered numerous car and house windows during the storm, he added.
Severe weather | heavy rain & hail | CSFD performing water rescues | flash flood warning til 1:00 am | stay indoors pic.twitter.com/42KMlRBtTF
— CSFD PIO (@CSFDPIO) July 29, 2016
