Arizona faced record-breaking hail and tornado events, back-to-back

This Day In Weather History is a daily podcast by Chris Mei from The Weather Network, featuring stories about people, communities and events and how weather impacted them.

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On Tuesday, October 5, 2010, supercell thunderstorms developed over central Arizona, dropping huge and destructive hail over the Phoenix Metropolitan Area.

The storm produced hailstones as large as 7.6 cm in diameter. The stones pummeled Phoenix, Glendale, Peoria, Mesa and Scottsdale, causing $2.81 billion (2010 USD) in damages.

The hail that fell that day is the third largest across the state. Since 1950, the largest stone recorded in Arizona measured 11.43 cm in diameter. The record-breaking hail fell near Mayer on Sept. 28, 1995.

Arizona faced some serious weather that week. On Oct. 6, 2010, a tornado outbreak hit the state. The outbreak included 10 twisters, the largest single-day tornado event in the state's recorded history.

"A home damaged by an EF2 tornado in Bellemont, Arizona." Courtesy of Wikipedia

The outbreak included six strong tornadoes (ranked as EF2+), which is rare for the area. The tornadoes caused seven injuries, and the overall extreme weather caused $4.41 billion in damage.

These two events were caused by a strong area of low pressure located off the coast of California. It produced a flow of warm, moist air into Arizona, which led to severe thunderstorms.

To learn more about the Arizona hailstorm, listen to today's episode of "This Day In Weather History."

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