Tokyo battles severe hail storms

Tokyo region battered by storms, severe hail. Tokyo and surrounding regions were hit with some extreme weather on June 24, as heavy rain, lightning storms and severe hail hit the area. The Japan Meteorological Agency has said that the wild weather is being stirred up by extreme temperature differences between warm ground-level air and a cold air mass — measured at minus 12 degrees Celsius and below — sitting about 5,500 meters above the national capital region. According to local residents in the Tokyo metropolitan cities of Mitaka and Chofu, several dozen centimeters of 10-yen-coin-sized hailstones fell on the area in the space of about an hour starting from around 3 p.m. Locals also said that the mix of heavy rain and hail formed whirlpools of ice and water in some places. http://mainichi.jp/english/english/newsselect/news/20140625p2a00m0na008000c.html