A severe Texan hail storm damaged thousands of solar panels at a Fort Bend County farm causing neighbors to fear potential chemical leakage from the panels, ABC 13 reported.

The freak and severe hail storm hit the farm and its environs on March 16, causing massive property damage throughout the affected area, the outlet reported.

“The hailstorm we experienced Saturday morning was unimaginable,” Nick Kaminski, a Ford Bend County resident, told the outlet. “We’ve never seen anything like it in our lifetime.” Kaminski’s own house suffered damage from the wind, causing the roof to come off, which was followed by hail, ABC 13 reported.

https://dailycaller.com/2024/03/26/hail-storm-destroys-thousands-of-solar-panels-in-texas/

I wondered the same with residential installations of solar panels. Some say they are "impact resistant". Maybe so for dime and pea size hail, but bigger hail could do some damage.

Estimating Hail Size
Hail size is often estimated by comparing it to a known object. Most hailstorms are made up of a mix of different sizes, and only the very largest hail stones pose serious risk to people caught in the open. When reporting hail, estimates comparing the hail to a known object with definite size are good, but measurements using a ruler, calipers, or a tape measure are best.
Pea = 1/4 inch diameter
Mothball = 1/2 inch diameter
Penny = 3/4 inch diameter
Nickel = 7/8 inch
Quarter = 1 inch — hail quarter size or larger is considered severe
Ping-Pong Ball = 1 1/2 inch
Golf Ball = 1 3/4 inches
Tennis Ball = 2 1/2 inches
Baseball = 2 3/4 inches
Tea cup = 3 inches
Softball = 4 inches
Grapefruit = 4 1/2 inches

How fast does hail fall?
This is a very complicated answer. The fall speed of hail primarily depends on the size of the hailstone, the friction between the hailstone and surrounding air, the local wind conditions (both horizontal and vertical), and the degree of melting of the hailstone. Early research assumed that hailstones fell like solid ice spheres and showed very high fall speeds, even for very small hailstones. However, recent research outside of NSSL using 3-D printed casts of real hailstones suspended in a vertical wind tunnel has repeatedly shown that natural hailstones fall more slowly than solid ice spheres. For small hailstones (<1-inch in diameter), the expected fall speed is between 9 and 25 mph. For hailstones that one would typically see in a severe thunderstorm (1-inch to 1.75-inch in diameter), the expected fall speed is between 25 and 40 mph. In the strongest supercells that produce some of the largest hail one might expect to see (2-inches to 4-inches in diameter), the expected fall speed is between 44 and 72 mph. However, there is much uncertainty in these estimates due to variability in the hailstone’s shape, degree of melting, fall orientation, and the environmental conditions. However, it is possible for very large hailstones (diameters exceeding 4-inches) to fall at over 100 mph.

https://www.nssl.noaa.gov/education/svrwx101/hail/


weather geek 101

That looks expensive

It is a once in a lifetime storm to cause this
If it’s real

Most of them say up to around 2" hail I think. I've never seen 2" hail in my lifetime.

Certainly it's possible to have hail larger than that. But that doesn't mean solar panels shouldn't be used in Texas

wow, an amazing amount of land covered up with those solar panels

I personally have never seen 2" hail either but have seen pics from others

Hail is pretty rare in this part of the country as in FB County.

The area south of Pecan Plantation is about to have 5k acres covered in panels. Nice Brazos riverfront property ruined for miles. Throw in some obnoxious bitcoin mining bldgs and it sets the future of that area. What a shame.

I saw back a number years ago in northern wyoming we got a big hail storm and it was like baseball to softball size it was going through moon roofs in cars some went clean through roof on house into the houses themselves. 'i got in on lower in of it came with in 5,000 of totaling out a brand GMC Denali pickup.

Got into Chevy dealer next morning at 9:30 I was three months out getting fixed because of so many vehicles already in line in front of me

I never saw anything close the other 19 years living there they said once in a lifetime storm. but boy did it do the damage. I foget how many hail damage people showed up and stayed like three months fixing cars for cash. Dentless repair. I was surprised it sure worked to.

we've had it here on several occasions.

Some hail is softer than other hail. Some is almost slushy and when some of the hard stuff hits the tin roof here I'll yell out "What the hail?"

Panels do pretty well in hail, I think. We have had some make it through hail that was a little bigger than golf ball size and they did okay without any damage.

I imagine if you have hail going through your roof, then your panels would be toast, too.

I have seen softball size hail while at college in Big Spring. It flattened the roof of cars.

Anyone remember the Mayfest storm?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1995_Mayfest_Storm