Severe thunderstorms swept across Colorado and the broader Central Plains on June 25–26, unleashing destructive hail as the vacation and outdoor season builds toward the Fourth of July holiday. Parts of the Front Range and Eastern Plains were placed under an Enhanced Risk for severe weather, with the strongest cells capable of producing hailstones between 2 and 3 inches (5 to 7.6 cm) in diameter, roughly tennis ball to baseball size, capable of damaging vehicles, roofs, windows, and crops. HailPoint data confirms multiple damage events across Colorado on both days, with stones reaching 2.5 inches (6.4 cm) on June 25 and 2.25 inches (5.7 cm) on June 26.
How Hail Forms
Hail develops inside powerful thunderstorm updrafts, where supercooled water droplets are carried high into the atmosphere and freeze around a small nucleus, such as a dust particle or ice crystal. As the nascent hailstone is cycled up and down within the storm’s updraft and downdraft, successive layers of ice accumulate around it, much like the layers of an onion. The stronger the updraft, the longer the stone is suspended aloft and the larger it can grow before gravity finally pulls it to the ground. Winds in the most intense supercells can exceed 100 mph (161 km/h) vertically, sustaining stones well above the freezing level and allowing them to reach destructive sizes. Colorado’s high elevation shortens the distance between the ground and the freezing level, which means hailstones have less time to melt on the way down, arriving at the surface larger and more intact than they would at lower altitudes.
Colorado’s eastern plains sit in the heart of what meteorologists call “Hail Alley,” a corridor that sees 20 to 30 hailstorms per year and experiences more large, damaging hail than anywhere else in North America. NWS meteorologist Greg Heavener attributes the region’s particular vulnerability to elevation: the plains sit close enough to the atmosphere’s freezing level that hailstones have less time to melt before reaching the ground.
That distinction came at a heavy price this week. In Wiggins, resident Hilary Hancock described Tuesday night’s storm as sounding like someone throwing baseballs at her house. The hail shattered her minivan’s windshield, blew out windows, and punched holes through her children’s backyard slide. “If you have north-facing windows, you probably don’t now,” she said. Just east in Fort Morgan, ping-pong-sized hail (around 1.5 inches / 3.8 cm) on Wednesday left dozens of cars with smashed windshields. “This is the most severe it’s been out of my whole life living here, really,” said resident Juan Baltazar.
Hail storm batters Colorado's eastern plains, leaving damage to cars and homes. #colorado #hailstorm #madraslive pic.twitter.com/6f8h7P0ayH
— madraslive (@madraslive) June 26, 2026
The severe weather risk is not over for Colorado. This is a conditional setup: not everyone will see a storm, but any cell that does develop could turn severe rapidly. Storms are expected to first fire near the Front Range during the late Tuesday afternoon hours, with the main window opening Tuesday evening into Tuesday night for the Denver metro area and northeast plains. Farther south, including Colorado Springs and Pueblo, the threat may persist later into the night as storms track southeast across the plains.
Cities under some level of severe weather risk include Denver, Boulder, Fort Collins, Greeley, Castle Rock, Colorado Springs, Pueblo, Limon, Fort Morgan, Sterling, Burlington, and Lamar. While hail remains the dominant threat, the tornado risk is not zero. An isolated tornado could occur with any sustained supercell. Additional rounds of strong to severe storms are possible Wednesday and Thursday across Colorado’s lower elevations, and with deepening moisture and repeated heavy rain, flash flooding will become an increasing concern.
A potent storm system is tracking eastward across the Appalachians, bringing heavy and locally excessive rainfall north of its track, with flooding risks extending toward the upper mid-Atlantic coast. Farther south, thunderstorms are threatening hail, flooding downpours, and damaging wind gusts from Missouri and Arkansas to southern Virginia and North Carolina.
OUCH ☔️🫣 Large hail has been pelting the Front Range of Colorado this week – with some reports of over baseball-size hail from these storms! It's a rinse & repeated type of forecast – as the Front Range & Central Plains brace for another day of hail, wind & an isolated tornado… pic.twitter.com/ptHVfZERdM
— WeatherNation (@WeatherNation) June 25, 2026
Central U.S. Braces for a Stormy Week Ahead
The engine for thunderstorms will continue grinding over the Plains through the weekend and into next week, fueled by warm, humid air, daytime heating, and an unusually strong jet stream. The bulk of severe weather will focus on the northern Plains and Midwest, where the most potent storms could produce tornadoes, damaging hail, straight-line winds, and torrential downpours through Monday. This setup, with a massive heat dome building to the south, can sustain long-lasting severe thunderstorm complexes traveling hundreds of miles (several hundred kilometers). In the most intense cases, these can develop into derechos.
As the heat dome establishes itself over the Midwest next week, storm complexes will ride around its rim from the Rockies and High Plains toward the northern Midwest and Northeast. Meanwhile, farther south, separate complexes may move in an unusual east-to-west direction along the Gulf Coast, and will need to be monitored for the potential to acquire tropical characteristics.
