Snow in Zimbabwe? Gov't says it was hailstone

A combination of hail and sleet that fell in central Zimbabwe over the weekend, fueling a spate of discussion on the social media platforms, speculating that a rare snow had occurred in this southern African country.

Head of public weather services in the Meteorological Services Department Tich Zinyemba told Xinhua Monday that they suspected it was a hailstone caused by heavy thunderstorms associated with very cold updrafts.

"From the footage we have seen we suspect that it was a massive hailstorm with a combination of sleet," he said, suggesting that temperatures might also have been very low.

Zinyemba said a team from his office would be travelling to Lower Gweru on Monday to establish what exactly transpired there, and would interview locals who witnessed the phenomenon.

"The hailstones were as big as golf balls and fell over a radius of about 5 km. We are actually on our way there to get information from the locals on what actually transpired," he said.

Lower Gweru, which is about 45 km from the Midlands capital of Gweru, is associated with very low temperatures in winter.

A number of pictures were circulating on social media over the weekend with people fearing that the current winter would be very cold.

Snow last occurred in Zimbabwe's Nyanga Mountains in 1935 and is not common in Africa, except in parts of South Africa, Lesotho and the Maghreb region of northwest Africa comprising the coastlands and the Atlas Mountains of Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia. Endit