44 KANSAS CITY R E VIEW OF SCIENCE. 



The rainfall was very heavy, 2.82 inches being collected during the two hours 

 and twenty minutes that the storm prevailed. Throughout the lower part of the 

 city the streets were transformed into canals, the water in many sections being 

 waist deep and flooding the lower stories of dwellings. All street travel was. 

 necessarily suspended. 



The largest hailstones appear to have fallen in the western portion of the city, 

 that being the section first traversed by the storm. Gentlemen whose statements 

 cannot be accepted as otherwise than perfectly reliable, affirm that in that quarter 

 of the city the hailstones were as large hens' eggs in their greatest circumference. 

 Assertions are made that hailstones of this size were picked up after fragments of 

 them had been broken off by violent contact with the pavement. A prominent 

 gentleman who picked up and measured two large hailstones, gives their dimen- 

 sions as follows: One, 2^ inches long, 2% inches wide, and i*4 inches thick; 

 the other, 2^ inches long, 2% inches wide, and 1% inches thick. 



The damage occasioned throughout the city was considerable. Sky-lights 

 and window-glass were broken, conservatories, nurseries and hot-houses suffering 

 severely in this respect, with the addition of the total destruction of many valuable 

 plants. Many of the slates which form the roof covering of the majority of 

 houses in this city were cracked and splintered, while some of the extra heavy 

 plate-glass (5^ inch in thickness) in the sky-lights of the U. S. Custom House 

 were cracked. Trees were denuded of their foliage, shrubbery beaten to the 

 ground, and one instance of serious bodily injury is recorded from the falling hail- 

 stones. 



During the prevalence of the storm a game bird, of a species known as ' ' blue 

 rail," and which is rarely seen in this section, though sometimes encountered in 

 the marshes 100 miles south of the city, fell to the pavement dead. Upon exam- 

 ination its back and wings were found to be covered with ice, showing it to have 

 passed through a current of air whose temperature must have been considerably 

 below 32 °. 



The fall of temperature during the progress of the hail storm is somewhat re- 

 markable. At 6 p. m. the thermometer read 8o°. At 6:25 p. m. it stood at 65% 

 a fall of 1 5 in twenty-five minutes. 



But little wind accompanied the storm, the highest recorded velocity being 

 twelve miles per hour. Violent gusts at street corners and exposed places, suffi- 

 cient to destroy umbrellas, tear down signs, awnings, etc., were reported. The 

 wind, which previous to the storm had been blowing gently from the southeast, 

 after its passage blew briskly from the north. 



Advices from various portions of this State show similar, though much less 

 violent and remarkable disturbances to have taken place. 



New Orleans, La., April 21, 1879. 



