Vicious winds, heavy rain and large hail hit Saskatchewan

It was a weekend of very erratic weather in Saskatchewan.

On Saturday, it was a scorching day, with 11 heat records being broken throughout the province in the Assiniboia, Broadview, Elbow, Lucky Lake, Melfort, Moose Jaw, Outlook, Rockglen, Regina, Saskatoon and Watrous areas.

On Sunday, it was a completely different arrangement of weather, as a powerful storm ripped through the southeast.

According to Environment Canada meteorologist James Colangelo, the system certainly left its mark.

“We actually had quite a quite a number of reports from the storm,” he said. “We got reports of hail being as large as baseballs.

“The wind estimates right now is that there were gusts up to 100 kilometres per hour. There was also lots of flooding and tree damage reported.”

Wheatheart auger for sale. A few scratches that should be able to be buffed out. No lowballers, I know what I have. #skstorm pic.twitter.com/r04ktRB3Ko

— Brady Sproat (@bsproat) June 20, 2022

The Kipling, Whitewood, Rocanville and other areas near Moosomin all were hit hard in the storms path.

Outflow ripping in Moosomin, SK took down this sign. 16:08. #SKStorm @BraydonMoreSo @SeanSchofer @curtisbrooks80 pic.twitter.com/IQoByaI2TH

— Mhairi (@Mahairy93) June 19, 2022

Amanda Beitel works in the Rocanville area. She says the clouds were unlike anything she has seen.

“They were green,” she said. “They were green for miles.

“It was very intense. There might be some roof damage to our building after all of the hail.”

From near Kipling absolutely monster of a storm!#skstorm pic.twitter.com/fAPjS5Wa21

— Mitch Healey (@MitchHealeyPics) June 19, 2022

Ken Patel in Whitewood shared a similar story.

He said lots of truckers found themselves pulled over to avoid the downpour.

“It was very bad,” he said. “So dark, lots of lightning.

“Everybody is stopped here.”

It wasn’t just the southeast that saw stormy conditions. Parts of the southwest briefly saw some wild weather.

Around the Laporte area, roughly 40 kilometres east of the Alberta border, the weather office confirmed a tornado sighting in the area.

“It was very small, very brief,” Colangelo said. “It did not look super-threatening.”

As of Monday morning, Environment Canada did not have data on how much rainfall ended up falling on Sunday.