Several vehicles were damaged and trees uprooted across Islamabad as hailstorm along with heavy rain and strong winds caught the citizens unawares Wednesday afternoon.
The rain and hailstorm were so strong that the day turned dark at around 4:00 p.m.and the motorists as well as the motorcyclists had to turn on their vehicles’ lights to reach their destination after the storm that lasted a little short of one hour was over.
It was an intense hailstorm and the size of the hailstones was unusually large, said a shopkeeper Jamal whose shop is in the Blue Area Fazl-ul-Haq Road.
Never in the history of the federal capital I have seen the hailstones of that size, the 21-yearold Jamal said.
Not only vehicles were damaged, many houses also bore the brunt of the strong winds as their window panes were smashed and rooftops were damaged due to the coming down of the trees or their branches.
Although in the wake of the hailstorm and heavy rain the weather turned a little pleasant yet the damage it caused to the cars parked in various markets of the federal capital and houses was immense.
The hailstones smashed the wind and the back screens of many cars while in some parts trees fell on the vehicles.
Irfan whose Honda City was heavily damaged said there was no caution by the authorities nor any announcement was made beforehand.
Had I known it was going to be such a nasty storm I would never have taken my car out, he said.
Meanwhile, the Met office has forecast more rains in the federal capital and the adjacent Rawalpindi in the next couple of days.
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) would also face a similar type of weather condition, an official of the Met Office said.
Senator Sherry Rehman former Climate Change Minister and a vocal advocate of green practices has also commented on the changing patterns of weather saying it was unprecedented.
She termed the hailstorm as being “insane” adding that hail was “coming down like pellets”.
This is extreme weather volatility driven by climate change, where anomalies proliferate.
Not a random natural event, she said in her post on social media.
It is related entirely to human actions like emissions, which are growing because of addiction to dirty energy,” she further said.
