The most recent reported hail day was 2025-04-14 -- 1 year ago, with nothing reported since. Harlan County is hit in about half the years on record. The largest stone on record here is 2.75 inches, a baseball and 2.8 times the National Weather Service's 1 inch severe criterion, reported on 2012-03-02 near Lenarve.
Colored swath = NOAA MRMS radar-estimated hail size; dots = NOAA SPC reports in Kentucky. Radar-indicated, not a guarantee of damage.
The last hail here fell on 2025-04-14, around Loyall. A free SwathIQ account -- hand-reviewed, invite within 24-48h -- pulls Harlan County addresses inside a hail swath above your size threshold into a door-knock list you can export, scoped to your approved markets.
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See call-center options ->NOAA's Storm Prediction Center has logged 14 separate hail days here since 2010 -- 0.8 a year over 17 years of record. Those days carry 29 separate reports between them, two or three on a typical one. 8 of those 17 years produced none at all. One year dominates the record: 2018 alone produced 3 of the 14 days. The last five years track the long-run rate, with 4 days since 2022.
2 of the 14 days reached 2 inches or more -- 14%, or about one hail day in 7, the last on 2018-05-05. Those big days do not follow the county's usual calendar: most of them fall in March, not May. 4 of the 14 days reached golf-ball size, 1.75 inches or bigger.
Across the whole of Kentucky, see the Kentucky hail map and history.
Reports cluster nearest Harlan -- 4 of the county's 14 hail days -- then Baxter (3), Wallins Creek (2), Evarts (2) and Loyall (2).
| Place | Hail days since 2010 | Largest stone |
|---|---|---|
| Baxter | 3 | 1.75″ |
| Harlan | 2 | 1.75″ |
| Wallins Creek | 2 | 1.75″ |
| 3 Sse Harlan | 2 | 1.00″ |
| Evarts | 2 | 1.00″ |
The season runs April through August: 12 of the 14 hail days on record fall in those 5 months (86%). May is the single busiest month, with 5 of them (36%). That peak sits inside the window rather than at either end. Hail has also been reported in February and March, outside that window. Reports span 6 of the 12 calendar months; the other 6 have never produced one.
| Month | Hail days |
|---|---|
| February | 1 |
| March | 1 |
| April | 4 |
| May | 5 |
| July | 1 |
| August | 2 |
That day put 2 reports on the map, the biggest 1 inch near Loyall. No hail day has been reported here yet this year.
| Date | Max hail | Reports |
|---|---|---|
| 2025-04-14 | 1.00″ | 2 |
| 2025-02-06 | 1.75″ | 1 |
| 2024-08-17 | 1.00″ | 1 |
| 2022-05-19 | 1.00″ | 1 |
| 2018-05-07 | 1.00″ | 1 |
| 2018-05-06 | 1.75″ | 1 |
| 2018-05-05 | 2.50″ | 3 |
| 2015-04-25 | 1.50″ | 1 |
The colored swath is NOAA's MRMS radar estimate of the largest hail per ~1 km cell; the dots are SPC ground reports. Yellow is about an inch, red 1.5 to 2″, purple 2″ and up (hail size vs roof damage). On this county's worst day the reports reached 2.75 inches, which is the purple band. Look up a street address with the hail history by address tool.
The nearest counties with a page of their own, over the state line included: Breathitt County (16 hail days), Laurel County (15), Floyd County (13), Lee County, Virginia (15) and Hawkins County, Tennessee (16). Harlan County sits in between.
Breathitt County · Laurel County · Floyd County · Lee County, Virginia · Hawkins County, Tennessee
Back to the Kentucky hail map or the U.S. hail map.
Data & method: NOAA/NWS Storm Prediction Center reports + NOAA MRMS MESH radar, Harlan County, Kentucky only. Radar-indicated and observation-based -- informational only, not a guarantee of damage or a valid claim.