Washington, D.C

Here’s why there was a downpour of large hail in the D.C. area on Monday

Published

2 years ago

April 16, 2024

Here’s why there was a downpour of large hail in the D.C. area on Monday

In a relatively uncommon occurrence for the region, a widespread downpour of large hail impacted parts of the District and Loudoun, Fairfax and Prince George’s counties Monday afternoon, as a severe thunderstorm storm raced east and southeast across the area. Readers captured numerous photos and videos of the hail, while three-dimensional radar imagery detailed a stunning view of the storm’s inner workings.

Dozens of severe-hail reports were logged by the National Weather Service. Hail that is about one inch in diameter, or roughly the size of a quarter or larger, is considered severe with the potential for damage. Hail as big as golf balls — which are 1.68 inches in diameter and more likely to leave dents in vehicles — was reported near Brambleton in southeast Loudoun County. Another storm also tossed large hailstones to the north, in Montgomery County.

Significant hail days are not terribly common around Washington, but when they happen, it is often during the spring before peak thunderstorm season arrives. This is because of the combination of strengthening spring sunshine, which creates strong currents of rising air in the lower atmosphere, and a lingering winter chill at the mid-levels, plus stronger jet stream winds. These factors allow spheres of ice to rapidly grow within bubbling clouds.

One striking aspect about yesterday’s “hailers” is that they developed over the D.C. region less than 24 hours after a similar widespread outbreak of severe hail-producing thunderstorms across north-central Pennsylvania on Sunday afternoon. It was the same weather front, but a different atmospheric disturbance along it, that triggered Monday’s hail.

The conditions that produced severe hail

The strong contrast between warm, relatively humid air in the lower atmosphere and cold, dry air higher up was a key factor in promoting the explosive thunderstorm growth that produced the large hail, but it wasn’t the only aspect.

A strong belt of winds from the west associated with the jet stream — a river of racing winds aloft — created a change in both the direction and speed of winds with height, or wind shear, which is typically required for powerful thunderstorms to develop.

The storm cells became powerful enough to keep growing hailstones suspended in the air, allowing them to swell to large sizes before falling to the ground. The longest-lived of the Monday storms qualified as supercells, at least at times. Supercells are characterized by strong and stable upward currents of air that persist for up to hours at a time. They are the types of storms most likely to produce severe hail and other hazards such as large tornadoes.

The swath of hail from southern Loudoun County to southern Prince George’s County seen on the image above was created by a single long-lived storm cell that is shown in the radar image below.

It had a very long track. The cell initiated northwest of Capon Bridge, W.Va., and pulsed up and down in severity. It appeared to have briefly generated hail over Winchester, Va., but then really got going over east-central Loudoun County, continuing in pulses through Fairfax County and southern D.C. and into Prince George’s County.

WTOP’s Dave Dildine reported cars suddenly parking under highway overpasses along the storm track, seeking refuge from the volley of large, potentially damaging hailstones. (As a brief aside, this is not advised for many reasons, including increased risk of accidents).

The radar image below, created with computer software that depicts the three-dimensional structure of the storm, shows intense precipitation lofted into freezing air above as the hail-generating supercell moved across Arlington. It is essentially a CT scan revealing the vertical structure of the storm, which towered to 45,000 feet, using microwave energy. This is shown in the figure below, as the hail-generating supercell was working across Arlington.

In this case, the mushroom-shaped inner core punches high up into the atmosphere like a fist. The air in that core was probably rising at speeds of 40 to 50 mph or faster.

The whole cloud is leaning, or tilting, because of the influence of the shearing winds. The white region below 10,000 feet represents the dense curtain of hail falling out of the storm. Few images so strikingly depict the impact of shearing winds on the development of a severe storm cell.

Photos and videos shared by readers

Impressive imagery and harrowing videos of the hail poured in via social media, especially on Facebook. One person said they had “never seen one this intense!”

Below are a few of the photos and videos we received. In the first photo, streaks of hail can be seen falling from the boiling mass of clouds amid the shining afternoon sun.

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Washington, D.C

Storm Team4 Forecast: A chilly, gusty Sunday before a cool start to the week

Published

4 hours ago

April 19, 2026

Press Room

Storm Team4 Forecast: A chilly, gusty Sunday before a cool start to the week

4 things to know about the weather:

Chances of rain in the morning
Gusty Sunday
Chilly Monday
Temps will rise again through the work week

Download the NBC Washington app on iOS and Android to check the weather radar on the go.

After a nice and warm Saturday, changes arrive for part two of the weekend.

The first half of your Sunday will have a chance for showers. Winds will pick up with our next system and are expected to gust to about 20-30 mph. Cooler air will settle in, and lows Sunday night fall into the 40s.

Highs temps Monday will reach only into the mid to upper 50s.

However, temperatures will rise through the week, so you won’t need your jackets every day.

QuickCast

SUNDAY:
Showers, then partly cloudy
Wind: NW 10-15 mph
Gusts @ 30 mph
HIGH: Lower 60s

MONDAY:
Partly cloudy
Wind: NW 10-15 mph
Gusts @ 25 mph
HIGH: Upper 50s

Stay with Storm Team4 for the latest forecast. Download the NBC Washington app on iOS and Android to get severe weather alerts on your phone.

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Washington, D.C

‘It’s a twilight zone’: Iran war casts deep shadows over IMF gathering in Washington

Published

1 day ago

April 18, 2026

Press Room

‘It’s a twilight zone’: Iran war casts deep shadows over IMF gathering in Washington

The most severe energy shock since the 1970s, the risk of a global recession and households everywhere stomaching a renewed surge in the cost of living – hitting the most vulnerable hardest.

In a sweltering hot Washington DC this week, the message at the International Monetary Fund meetings was chilling: things had been looking up for living standards around the world. But then came the Iran war.

“Some countries are in panic,” said the fund’s managing director, Kristalina Georgieva, addressing the finance ministers and central bank bosses in town for the IMF and World Bank spring meetings. “The sooner it [the Iran war] ends, the better for everybody.”

Such gatherings are not typically used to fight geopolitical battles. “You don’t get people shouting at one another at these things,” one senior figure remarked. But, as a record-breaking April heatwave swept the US capital, no one could ignore the mounting damage from the Iran war.

Those familiar with the mood over breakfast at a meeting of the G20’s representatives on Thursday, which included Donald Trump’s treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, and the outgoing US Federal Reserve chair, Jerome Powell – said the atmosphere in the room was sombre amid an open exchange of serious views.

“It is such a twilight-zone meeting,” said Mohamed El-Erian, a former IMF deputy managing director who is now chief economic adviser at the Allianz insurance group. “There are several shadows hanging over it: one is the shadow that comes from concern about the global economy as a whole.

“The second is that some countries are going to be particularly hard hit, and it’s mostly countries that very few people are talking about. But the third concern is the adding of insult to injury: the fact that the US, which started a war of choice, is going to be hit, but by a lot less than elsewhere in relative terms.”

Before Thursday’s breakfast, Rachel Reeves had started her day with an early-morning jog. Joined by her counterparts from Spain, Australia and New Zealand for a run down the iconic National Mall, she posted an Instagram selfie with a not-so-subtle dig: “Friends that run together – work together.”

A day earlier, the chancellor had told a CNBC conference that she thought “friends are allowed to disagree on things” as she criticised Trump’s Iran war as a “mistake” and a “folly” that had not made the world safer.

Rachel Reeves posted this image on Instagram from Washington DC on Thursday with the message: ‘Friends that run together – work together.’ Photograph: Rachel Reeves/Instagram

Speaking at a venue just steps away from the White House, before a one-on-one meeting with Bessent, she said this “fair message” was needed because UK families and businesses were feeling the pain from higher energy prices triggered by the conflict.

Those close to Reeves insist her meeting remained cordial. Britain and the US have significant shared interests in AI, financial services and trade. The chancellor also said the UK government had little time for the Iranian regime.

But with the IMF having warned on Tuesday that the Iran war could risk a global recession – in which Britain would be the biggest G7 casualty – it was clear Reeves had travelled to Washington ready to pick a fight.

“I’m struck by how vocal she has been and the words she used,” said one global financier. “We know the disagreement between Bessent and [European Central Bank president] Christine Lagarde earlier in the year. But that was in private.”

At a cocktail party held at the British ambassador’s residence for hundreds of diplomats and financiers – including the Bank of England’s governor, Andrew Bailey, the chief executive of Barclays, CS Venkatakrishnan, and dozens of senior figures – this transatlantic tension, weeks before King Charles’s US state visit, was a major topic of conversation.

The other, in the balmy residence gardens, was one of its former occupants, Peter Mandelson, as revelations about the former ambassador’s appointment threatened to further rock the UK government.

Before the war, the agenda for the IMF had been about global cooperation; the adoption of AI, jobs and work to eradicate poverty. Each of those tasks had now been complicated, but not least the task of countries working together.

For many at the meetings, the focus was on forging closer global cooperation without the world’s pre-eminent superpower.

“Everybody is talking about how you hedge against American decisions,” said David Miliband, the former UK foreign secretary, who now runs the International Rescue Committee. “You can’t do without them, because they’re 25% of the global economy. But, in a lot of fora, they’ve pulled out.

“So everyone has to think, how does one structure international cooperation? The old west is not coming back. And so everyone has to figure out how to position themselves for that world.”

For those gathering in Washington, there was irony in the fact that they were meeting in the halls of institutions founded, under US leadership, to promote global cooperation after the second world war. The whole idea of the Bretton Woods institutions was to avoid the dire economic conditions and warfare of the 1930s and 1940s. Yet this year’s meeting was taking place amid these intertwining problems.

In their conversations about the best economic policy response to the shock of conflict, the economists also knew the real power to make a difference lay two blocks across town from the IMF and the World Bank – behind the security cordons and construction equipment blocking the White House from public view. “It is not clear they can do anything about it,” said El-Erian.

Still, with a booming economy driven by AI – including Anthropic’s powerful Mythos model, the topic of much conversation – most countries cannot afford to completely break off US ties.

“People want to find ways to insulate themselves from the mess. But, on the other hand, they admire the US private sector,” El-Erian said. “The best way I’ve heard it put, is: they want to go long the private sector and short the mess. But it’s almost impossible to do.”

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