Ron Brackett and Jan Wesner Childs
Hail, some as big as baseballs, pummeled parts of Texas and Oklahoma Wednesday night, denting cars, shattering glass and, in at least one case, smashing through a home's roof.
The hail came from a line of severe storms that also triggered tornado warnings and caused flooding in Texas, Missouri, Arkansas and Oklahoma.
A hailstorm destroyed windows in Beth Van Horn's home in Norman, Oklahoma. Van Horn told KOCO she first thought a tornado was hitting because the storm was roaring so loudly.
She said she and her neighbors' west-facing windows were shattered by the hail. She said a number of cars were damaged as well.
(MORE: Severe Storms, Flooding Rain Threats Slide East)
Across Norman, just south of Oklahoma City, an untold number of homes, businesses and vehicles were damaged in the hailstorm, according to KWTV.
"Everyone was in the panic mode, kind of, then the hail started hitting. We started hearing it really loud,” Makaela Hughes, whose car was damaged by hail, told KOCO. "People were coming in from their cars like bleeding on their fingers and some of their legs and stuff."
Already, some are speculating the storm damage could be in the hundreds of millions of dollars, KOCO reported.
To the south in Texas, hailstorms popped up west and north of Fort Worth and west of San Antonio.
Overnight, numerous reports of hail-damaged cars came in from Westlake, Keller, Saginaw and the Alliance area north of Fort Worth, WFAA reported.
The storms overturned a mobile home in Azle, northwest of Fort Worth in Parker County, about 9 p.m. Wednesday, and three people had to be taken to a hospital because of their injuries, KXAS reported.
Severe storms also dumped hail west of San Antonio. Hailstones as large as 3 and 4 inches pounded Hondo, where there were also reports of a possible tornado.
The metal roof of a convenience store on U.S. Highway 90 was shredded, according to KABB, and many vehicles were damaged. Some of the cars' windshields were smashed by softball-size hail, the station reported.
The National Weather Service office in San Antonio said it would investigate the reports of a tornado after the sun came up Thursday. The Hondo school district announced classes would be canceled Thursday.
A few miles to the west, a large hailstone slammed through the roof of a home in Sabinal, according to a tweet from a user named @vortexrfd.
A Facebook user, Rihn Showpigs, shared a photo of a large hailstone that landed on their kitchen floor in Sabinal.
More than 32,000 homes and businesses remained without power as of 6:30 a.m. Thursday, according to poweroutage.us.
Officials on Thursday morning were cautioning drivers in the Dallas-Fort Worth area that standing water was still making the morning commute difficult.
More than 20 crashes with injuries were reported in Tarrant County between when the rain started and 6 a.m. Thursday, WFAA reported.
A jackknifed semitractor trailer blocked all lanes on northbound Interstate 35E at Valwood Parkway northwest of Dallas.
Earlier Wednesday, flooding was reported in Branson, Missouri, as well as several other areas, including Abilene, Texas, and Bentonville, Arkansas.
The Southern Stone County Fire Protection District said several motorists were stranded and had to be rescued in the Branson area.
There was also a possible tornado in Branson, where downed trees damaged a historic cabin at Shepherd of the Hills Farm.
Water washed through areas in and around Roaring River State Park, about 50 miles west of Branson.
"This is a major, major flood today," Paul Spurgeon, manager of the Roaring River fish hatchery, told the Springfield News-Leader. "We got about 3 inches in 40 minutes."
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An EF1 tornado was confirmed near Stillwell, Oklahoma, where several homes and barns were damaged when storms moved through around 6:15 a.m. Wednesday, according to the National Weather Service.
The Weather Company’s primary journalistic mission is to report on breaking weather news, the environment and the importance of science to our lives. This story does not necessarily represent the position of our parent company, IBM.
The Weather Company’s primary journalistic mission is to report on breaking weather news, the environment and the importance of science to our lives. This story does not necessarily represent the position of our parent company, IBM.
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