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Baseball-sized hail pelts northeast Houston neighborhood

If it’s not floodwater, it’s hail damage that Houstonians are now dealing with after torrential rain and severe thunderstorms pummeled Southeast Texas late this week.

Kayla Gatlin lives in a bright-blue, one-story home on Penelope Street in the El Dorado area, just northeast of the East Loop 610 and East Freeway interchange. She was ready for the storms to come through, heading officials’ many calls to stay home as the system dumped several inches of rain

But she wasn’t ready for baseball-sized hail that peppered the plastic sheeting like a giant buckshot, broke almost every window and caved in her ceiling.

“It started thundering and lightning,” Gatlin said as a contractor placed particle board over her shattered windows Friday afternoon. “A little rain started coming, and then 20 minutes after that, it sounded like someone was throwing baseballs at the house. That’s how bad it was. It was literally bad as soon as it started happening. It just started coming down, coming down straight through the house. We grabbed the kids out of their beds and ran in the kitchen, because our kitchen is closed off from everything else.”

For close to half an hour, almost the entire neighborhood was pegged with massive balls of ice falling from the sky, according to neighbors.

Manuel Armenta lives a few doors down from Gatlin and owns several houses that he rents out. He doesn’t have the right insurance for hail damage, he said, so he now has to pay for repairs out of his own pocket.

“(The hail), it was too much,” Artmenta said, adding that it sounded like a stampede on his roof. “It was (the size of) a baseball. It made a lot of holes on the roof. This roof is still leaking into a bedroom. It broke two windows. Right now, I have to buy material to replace it. I have to check all the houses I’ve got. I have three in here I have to fix.”

RELATED: Dramatic photos of severe flooding and storm damage across Houston area shared by readers

Armenta’s pickup truck wasn’t spared, the windshield shattered and headlamps broken. He was preparing to take it in for a state inspection next week but now has to make the proper repairs before it can pass.

Gatlin and her children were all uninjured even as glass was flying into the house. When the hail stopped, they packed up and made an 80-mile drive to stay with family in Beaumont.

When they returned Friday morning, Gatlin said the damage was worse than she imagined. Most of her possessions are ruined from water damage, she said.

“We don’t have to start completely over, but we’re at square one with a lot of things,” Gatlin said. “We’re just going to take it from here and put it in God’s hands.”

Jay R. Jordan covers breaking news in the Houston area. Read him on our breaking news siteChron.com, and our subscriber siteHoustonChronicle.com | Follow him on Twitter at @JayRJordan | Email him at jay.jordan@chron.com | Text CHRON to 77453 to receive breaking news alerts by text message

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