Some wild weather hit the city on Thursday afternoon, as pea-sized hail pounded East York and heavy winds toppled trees in Etobicoke.
The hail storm in East York occurred at around 2:30 p.m.
Reports from residents in the area indicate that there was a brief but intense downpour of pea-sized hail that forced some to run for cover.
Meanwhile, at around the same time heavy winds were reported at the opposite end of the city in Etobicoke.
One resident of a building on Dundas Street near Kipling Avenue said that the winds uprooted a large tree and blew down some construction scaffolding.
According to CP24 Meteorologist Chris Potter, the extreme weather is at least partly due to the arrival of cooler temperatures following a heat wave that ended on Wednesday.
“Usually during the summer months hail is associated with strong to severe thunderstorms,” he said. “Obviously it is much warmed during the summer months and that freezing layer above us is much higher so you need significant instability to allow the air to rise into that freezing layer and to allow that hail to develop. But it is cooler right now and because of that you don’t need significant amounts of instability or severe thunderstorms to create hail.”
Environment Canada says that there is a 60 per cent chance of showers this evening with the risk of a thunderstorm.
