Well we just got our power back like 10 minutes ago, so I'm here to tell you about this truly amazing storm. Here's the whole story.

So I wake up this morning, turn on my computer and boot into the Ubuntu Linux LiveCD and try to fix [url=http://forums.facepunchstudios.com/showthread.php?t=461074]this problem I am having with my computer.[/url]
My friend comes online on whatever messenger I was using, and after a while, we organize to go out today, then back to his house.

Fast forward a few hours to 2pm, I'm leaving the house to a [B]hot, sunny, cloudless day.[/B] I look up at the sky and wince, "[I]hell I don't want to skate in this weather".[/I]
I reluctantly began my walk/skate to where I was to meet my friend.
I got there, with the first beads of sweat forming on my forehead. I was hot.
I meet up with him, walked down to this chicken shop and we bought a Family Seasoned BBQ chicken and a 2l bottle of Apple and Guava fruit juice.
Yeah, we're rather fucked like that.
We ate our meal on the ground amongst tall trees outside of the shopping mall's carpark next to the road.
Yeah, we're fucked like that.

So anyway, we began walking back to his house, after sitting in this 'jungle' for almost an hour. Still, not a cloud in the sky. On the way to his house, we pass a primary school. We skate here for no more than 5 minutes, before we start to see clouds. Big clouds. Big, black clouds moving at fucking amazing speeds eating up the blue sky.
[I]"Kenji, let's just run to my house, right now."[/I]
said he.
[I]"No way man, this is going to be awesome."[/I]
Oh yeah. Awesome 'twas.
We were under this shelter thing, here's my diagram:

[img]http://img89.imageshack.us/img89/407/screenshotqd3.jpg[/img]
We were under this shelter. My friend was sitting in that corner, while I was sitting at the edge of the shelter.

So anyway, I'm sitting there on the ground watching the clouds in awe. It starts to get really quite windy. [B]Really[/B] windy.
I looked away to my left, and I could see rain. No, it wasn't just rain, it was a fucking storm. Rain was spinning, twirling around, falling to the ground. It was all a blurry gray, there was just so much rain.
This was literally, 50, 100 meters away from us. I looked up, the whole sky was black. This was it.
The first drop. It bounced off my leg, the drop hadn't even touched the ground before the second, the third, the fifth, the ninth, the thirtieth, that hit me.
"[I]Owen, it's starting to rain!"[/I]
I had barely finished my sentence when bang, we were right under the cloud. Rain fell ferociously. I laughed manically, this amazed me. Storms always do, but this one was just surreal. I ran back to the corner and sat next to my friend.
[I]"This is going to be fucking awesome. I'm excited."[/I]
What was I saying, what did I mean by "is" going to be awesome, this [I]was[/I] already awesome, I already [I]was[/I] excited, the rain was coming down extremely hard now. Our small shelter had already been compromised as rain came down around the outskirts of it. Had I been where I was seconds ago at that point, soaked would I have been.
We sat there in absolute astonishment as how quickly this happy Summer's day had become a huge aggressive storm.
The rain was quite literally, falling horizontally now. No, I think it was actually hooking up slightly, that's how crazy it was.
At the edges of this shelter, rain was literally centimeters deep, the drains couldn't handle such amounts of water in such a short period of time.
And then, what hit next, was completely unexpected.
*BANG!*, a clear sound was heard, barely over the sound of the crashing rain, from the aluminum/tin (?) shelter.
*BANG!*, another one, and then another, and another, and then finally I saw it.
It was hail. And it was coming down ruthlessly, crashing down into the ground, before either exploding into tiny segments on the hard ground, or sending splashes meters high in the air in all the rain that had been collected. The rain, too, was not far from horizontal, and many pieces had came close to us. I ran out and got one, the largest one I could find. To me then, it was fucking huge. I had never seen such large hail. I had only been through a few hail storms, and I was usually amazed at stuff like this, this was what I was used to (Google Image);

[img]http://img470.imageshack.us/img470/126/052801hailce8.jpg[/img]

Right? So just then, we were getting them this big, and I was quite amazed (Google Image);

[img]http://img89.imageshack.us/img89/7946/hailhandyi2.jpg[/img]

I ran back.
[I]"Jesus Christ, Owen, check this out!"[/I]

I threw it at him and turned around again, only to be greeted with even larger ones, like this (Google Image):

[img]http://img484.imageshack.us/img484/9884/golfballsizedhail1lrgds4.jpg[/img]

And by this I was simply shocked. Never had I ever dreamed of such large hail, even though it wasn't that big.
But, it just kept getting larger and larger, and ones this big started to fall (Google Image):

[img]http://img440.imageshack.us/img440/2787/hailga3.jpg[/img]

But by now, it was way too fucking scary to move out of the corner. Only meters away from us, hail had began to build up. Shards of fragmented ice flew hither and thither, with hail stones being thrown into the shelter from the sides by the vicious wind.
I couldn't run out and collect anymore, the chances are I would have been struck, forced to the ground, then riddled mercilessly by excessively compacted ice, falling at terminal velocity.
And that isn't really something I would like to do.

So we sat there, waiting.
But after a while, the thunder kicked in.
Fuck yeah, the thunder kicked in.
And the lightening.

The first bolt was clearly visible, cutting across the black canvas which the sky had transformed into.
Then boom.
No, more like *BOOM! FUCKING BOOM!*
It was loud, real loud. This lightening had struck less than a kilometer away, it was obvious.
The next one was bound to be closer.
We huddled.

Yeah, so what. We huddled.
We huddled like no men should ever huddle.
Before we could even get comfortable, a flash.
And then a tremendously loud sound. A moment after.
This means the lightening had struck fucking meters away from us.
He screamed, lol.
Now Owen, is like, 6 foot 2. I'm up to his chest. And he's quite built. And he's quite matured as well.
Whatever, the point is, he's not someone you would expect to yelp like Homer J Simpson.
But oh lawdy he did.

So anyway, we lied there, listening to his iPod, but not for long, as the storm had just passed its climax.
The sun broke through, the clouds moved on to traumatize another suburb for another time, because for now, it was done with Castle Hill, Sydney, Australia.

We lied there for moments, before arising to look around.



http://img209.imageshack.us/img209/3135/largehailcl7.jpg