For the first time since 2013, Singapore witnessed hailstone fall as heavy downpour happened in the north, east and central regions of the country. According to reports, the hail fall happened at about 04.30 PM on Tuesday, January 30. The hail fall literally surprised the residents in these areas, and they vigorously shot the incident and shared it on social media platforms.
Normal life of Singapore affected
Apart from the hail fall, the thunderstorm flooded roads and trees toppled in Singapore. As per the PUB, the flash floods which occurred in the country on January 30 were due to "overland flow from the storm which exceeded the capacity of the roadside drains".
The flash floods literally created havoc in the affected areas for nearly one hour, and finally, it subsided at 05.45 PM.
Authorities had issued a flash flood warning in Seletar North Link area on Tuesday morning and had asked commuters and motorists to avoid the route.
PUB working hard to combat flash floods
As flash floods are becoming quite common in Seletar North Link, PUB is reportedly working out a plan to construct two temporary drains in the area to alleviate flooding. According to reports, one of the drains will be completed by mid-February, while the second one will be done by May 2018. The authorities are also planning to build more permanent drainage systems to combat the problem of flash floods during thunderstorms.
Hailstone fall: A rare phenomenon in Singapore
Being a tropical country, hail fall is very rare in Singapore. "Hail forms in strong thunderstorm clouds, particularly those with intense updrafts, high liquid water content, great vertical extent, large water droplets and where a good portion of the cloud layer is below freezing 0 °C," explained the National Environment Agency (NEA), Singapore on its website.
However, the NEA has not commented anything regarding the latest hail fall.
