Weather tracker: new European record set as 19cm hailstone found in Italy

Huge hailstones pummelled continent before expected cooling down across much of central and southern Europe

Temperatures were not the only weather-related record to be broken over the past couple of weeks. The European hail record has been breached too. Twice.

On 19 July 2023, there were several very large hailstones, more than 10cm in diameter measured along their longest axis, recorded across parts of Italy and Croatia. One of these stones, measuring 16cm in diameter, was recorded in Carmignano di Brenta, Italy, and broke the previous largest hail record in Europe, which was previously held by a 15cm stone found in Romania in 2016.