Baseball-sized hail fell in parts of Connecticut during this weekend’s stormy Fourth of July — and it may have set a new state record.
The series of storms, which left more than 100,000 people without power in Connecticut, struck communities from eastern New York to Rhode Island, according to Bryce Williams, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service.
“We had a complex of storms move through the southern half of southern New England on the Fourth of July,” Williams said. “We had a few kind of supercell-looking storms… and behind them we had a strong line of storms which produced quite a bit of wind damage, in addition to some large hail.”
Williams said wind speeds were generally estimated to have hit anywhere between 50 to 65 miles per hour. This, along with the hail, caused widespread damage in several parts of Connecticut.
There were no reports of injuries or deaths directly attributable to the storms as of Monday, according to the state Department of Emergency Services and Public Protection. Nor were there any instances of major flooding, Rick Green, a spokesperson with the agency said. Most of the damage came from heavy winds and downed trees, he said.
There were reports of 3-inch and 1.25-inch hail in the areas of Bristol, Plainville and New Britain, according to Williams, of NWS. While the official numbers are not yet verified, the largest hail Connecticut had recorded before Saturday was 2.75 inches, which first set the record during a 1969 storm, according to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration data.
“We could not find any reports of any 3-inch hail since we’ve been keeping records, so there’s potential that it could be one of the biggest hailstorms recorded in Connecticut,” Williams said.
The last time Connecticut saw hail that size was in 1995, when a storm met the previous record of 2.75 inches.
Hailstorms in the state have become more frequent and widespread over the past 30 years, according to the NOAA data. In recent years, individual hailstorms, like the one seen this weekend, have hit multiple towns across the state.
Gary Lessor, the chief meteorologist at Western Connecticut State University, said what was exceptional about this weekend’s storms was the size of the affected area: Two wide bands moving diagonally across the state from northwest to southeast.
“A lot of times, you know, you’ll get it in Litchfield County, maybe Litchfield and Hartford counties, or Fairfield and New Haven, then they kind of dissipate as they go east,” Lessor said. “But we had so much heat, we had so much humidity that it maintained itself into the evening. So, the front came through, it had enough energy at the surface — meaning heat and again the humidity — that we had the destructive storms.”
Williams said the heatwave that hit the region late last week helped set the stage for the storms.
“We just had an atmosphere that was very conducive to thunderstorms, and that continued all the way through the state,” Williams said. “So it just didn’t run out of juice.”
Leading up to the storms, temperatures exceeded 90 degrees for three consecutive days at Bradley International Airport in Windsor Locks, according to the most recent NOAA data.
On Thursday, July 2, the mercury at Bradley hit 100 degrees, breaking the previous daily record of 99 degrees set in 1966. The all-time high temperature recorded in Connecticut, 106 degrees, was set in 1916 and again in 1995.
In recent years, days with temperatures in the 90s and 100s have become more frequent in the state.
Since June 1949, there have been 186 “hot streaks,” or periods of three days or more where the maximum temperature measured 90 degrees or higher at Bradley. Since 1999, there have been 82 hot streaks — or over 44% of all recorded occurrences.
At its peak from Saturday night into Sunday, the storm produced about 94,000 outages across Eversource’s service territory in Connecticut, according to spokesman Max Reiss. Reiss said the utility restored power to about 120,000 customers over the weekend and early Monday. (The number of restorations is higher than the peak, because not all outages were reported at the same time.)
As of Monday afternoon, the utility reported that 23,153 customers remained without power, or about 1.76% of its customers.
The company announced over the weekend that it brought in crews from Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Canada to help with restoration efforts. Reiss said 99% of affected customers are expected to have power back by Tuesday night.
United Illuminating reported Monday afternoon that it still had 13 outages, affecting 199 customers.
The outage numbers were similar to another series of unusually powerful storms that swept through the state on May 15, 2018, producing several small tornadoes and causing extensive damage at Sleeping Giant State Park in Hamden.
That storm produced more than 120,000 outages at its peak, according to the Hartford Courant, and it took some customers more than a week to get their power back on.
While this year’s Fourth of July weekend storms did not produce any significant flooding in Connecticut, by Monday morning that had become a top concern of state officials — particularly following the devastating series of floods that hit the Naugatuck River Valley in August 2024.
Gov. Ned Lamont held a remote teleconference with municipal leaders and emergency management directors on Monday to monitor their preparations ahead of several days of expected rainfall.
“There’s a concern that this rain we’re seeing today right now could turn into a flooding situation.” Green of DESPP said. “That’s a big concern today.”
