FORT PIERRE — A rotating column of air in contact with the ground happened Tuesday as severe storms and hail marched through the Pierre/Fort Pierre. There has been some debate on social media as to if the spinning mass of clouds was a tornado or a land spout. Kelly Serr at the National Weather Service in Aberdeen says land spouts are tornadoes but the differences are minor…
The Stanley County twister was connected to the parent thunderstorm where land spouts are very similar to dust devils…
The largest hail reported was around four-and-a-half inches which Serr says is very significant and very rare…
A five-inch hail stone found in Pierre was the largest in Hughes County since June of 1997 and August of 2018 when a four-inch hailstone fell. While the hail in Pierre and Fort Pierre was not record setting, central South Dakota is no stranger to massive frozen rocks in the sky. A hail stone measuring eight inches in diameter and 18 and a half inches in circumference landed in Vivian in Lyman County on July 23rd of 2010. That hail stone weighed in at just under two pounds.
