Warning shot from nature

There were heavy hailstorms lashing out at Islamabad and parts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa last Wednesday. These were no ordinary hailstorms but perhaps the severest of their kind in recent history as they pelted golf ball size hail that wantonly smashed car windscreens and house windows, creating panic among the residents of the affected areas.

Though the storm only lasted a little over half an hour in Islamabad it wrought considerable damage, especially to solar panels resulting in considerable financial loss to the owners. Children playing out in the open were also frightened and ran indoors to save themselves. After the storm subsided it looked like a battle field with rows of cars whose glasses were smashed and the streets and gardens littered with hail.

The news of this unusual phenomenon soon spread to the four corners of the country as in this digital age stories with pictures of this hail storm were soon circulating on digital communication channels not only within Pakistan but across the world. This was another proof that Pakistan is in the line of fire of global weather change and in fact seems to be in the forefront of this dangerous global phenomenon.

I wonder how many people realize that Pakistan is ranked as the 5th most vulnerable country to climate change, according to the Global Climate Risk Index. This means that the nerve shattering experience our friends in the capital city of the country endured last Wednesday was not a freak incident but in the coming days and months it might even intensify and the country as a whole might experience increasingly severe extreme climate events of which the Islamabad storm was just a trailer.

This is one message that our government has repeatedly expressed at all concerned forums and emphasized the fact that global weather changes are not fueled by countries like Pakistan but other countries who should also bear the responsibility for their actions and help Pakistan in combating the serious challenges posed by weather change and consequent events like the one in Islamabad last week.

Why are hailstones called by this name? Hailstones are called hailstones because the word “hail” refers to the phenomenon of ice falling from the sky, and “stones” refers to the individual pieces of ice that usually are formed like small balls of ice. In ancient times these were attributed to punishment by the gods for the ill deeds of the area residents targeted by these hailstones.

Now we know differently even now this is retribution from nature on our way of life that harms nature and creates misbalance between different natural forces to create such a scenario. This is in spite of warnings from those in the knowhow. The storm recently in our capital city was severe but the world has also seen much more severe and destructive hail storms.

It is interesting to note and perhaps be aware that the biggest hailstone ever recorded was found in the USA in the state of Dakota in July 2010; it was 8 inches in diameter and weighed 1.9375 pounds and had a circumference of 18.625 inches. Closer to home among the heaviest hailstones on record are also hailstones that fell in Bangladesh in 1986 and weighed about 2.25 pounds each as recorded by the Guinness Book of World Records.

With increased global weather changes the hailstone activity has also intensified. The European severe storms laboratory documented a range of severe weather activities, including severe hailstorms in Tuscany, Italy and Andalusia. These hailstorms like the one in Islamabad caused damage to roofs, cars and crops .Other hailstorms in Colorado, the USA, brought property damage and floods. All this is nature striking back at our wanton destruction of the environment.

Pakistan that has been a victim of floods causing immense damage to crops and property is now facing other natural disasters like hail storms which might even intensify in the coming days. Already we are facing unnaturally high temperatures which are not natural for this time of the year.

While we cannot control the pollution in other countries we should very seriously control pollution at our end. If you wander out on a busy road you can see nearly every other vehicle and specially the heavier traffic leaving behind a tale trail of smoke and then there are numerous other contributors like those burning waste in the open and other such active contributors to pollution in our skies. Time to wake up. Hailstorm in Islamabad was the opening shot from nature. Let us not defy it any more.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2025