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Comment by adolph | Hacker News Reader

I don’t understand how “DVD” sized hail is different from “grapefruit” sized. A DVD is 120mm, or about 4 3/4 inches. A grapefruit is “ranges from 100 to 150 mm (4 to 6 inches) in diameter, its size depending upon the variety and upon growing conditions.” [0]

Also, the hail depicted in the image did not appear to be one hailstone but an accumulation of several.

0. https://www.britannica.com/plant/grapefruit

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It’s different because the National Weather Service uses “grapefruit-sized” specifically to refer to hail that is more than 4.5 inches in diameter but no more than 5 inches in diameter. It isn’t “any hail that is about the size of a grapefruit”.

This hail was bigger than 5 inches, so NWS needed a new term for it per their estimation guidelines.

Better than Banana sized, I guess.

Using “DVD” doesn’t seem to make sense because, as noted, the diameter of a DVD is less than 5 inches.

>Also, the hail depicted in the image did not appear to be one hailstone but an accumulation of several.

Concretions of hailstones in the air do occur which is how you can get to these larger diameters.

Something this large would have a difficult time forming any other way. The sheer weight of it would cause it to not stay aloft long enough to get to that size.

Also, does it matter how it was formed? A chunk of ice of that size falling from the ground causing damage doesn't care if it's a single round ice cube for a really large cocktail glass or if it made up of lots of smaller things frozen together as a single piece of ice. The object getting hit doesn't care of it's formation and makeup either. It's still going to hurt. Bad.

The size of a single hailstone indicates the number of times it was relofted and another layer added to it. This quantifies the storm in a way that an aggregate of smaller stones doesn’t.

Also children may not even know what a DVD is, so "new" is a reach. In 2034 it's going to be just like saying "8-track sized" in 2024.

next size up from grapefruit is pomelo I think, then maybe durian, or cantelope, then honeydew and watermelon

Next size up from grapefruit according to ISO is small red cabbage, then small green cabbage followed by cantaloupe.

As a weatherman, David Letterman once described hail stones from a storm as being "the size of canned hams".

Citing the dimensions of a grapefruit... Hackernews, never change

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