Sebewaing, MI Hail Storm – September 2026

A multi-zone hail storm tracked through Sebewaing, Michigan on September 2, 2026, producing peak 2.3-inch hail and intermittent episodes of large stones from late afternoon into the overnight period. The event generated a series of National Weather Service alerts and multiple spotter-verified observations across eastern Michigan.

What Happened

NWS issued 11 alerts for this event between 3:11 PM and 2:30 AM local time. Early warnings began in the mid-afternoon and continued into the evening, with several alerts specifying 1.0-inch to 2.0-inch hail as the storms moved across multiple counties. A dual-polarization radar detection of hail was recorded at 10:23 PM during the overnight redevelopment, while most advisories were issued as NWS warning only products earlier in the event.

Field reports anchored the sequence on the ground. At 5:38 PM, multiple spotters and public submitters in Birch Run provided images showing recovered hailstones up to 2.0 inches in diameter, a report logged as spotter-verified. Around 6:04 PM, two spotter-verified reports arrived from the 6600 block of Hart Lake Road noting quarter-sized hail at the surface. Late in the event, Ingham County Emergency Management relayed a spotter-verified quarter-sized hail report at 10:32 PM as the line shifted southeast.

The storm behaved as a multi-wave system. Initial late-afternoon cells produced the largest recovered stones in the Birch Run area. A reintensification occurred in the early evening with NWS warnings near 7:00 PM noting 2.0-inch hazard potential along portions of the track. Renewed radar-detected returns late that night corresponded with the Ingham County relay and additional NWS alerts through 2:30 AM.

Damage Assessment

Field imagery from Birch Run documented stones recovered at the surface and multiple public images were retained with the local storm report submitted at 5:38 PM. Those surface recoveries show localized concentrations where spotters were active. The two spotter-verified reports from Hart Lake Road record surface recovery at the residence block level during peak convective activity.

No centralized NWS damage survey was attached to the public Local Storm Reports provided with these observations. The Ingham County relay at 10:32 PM indicates additional, smaller hail accumulation during the overnight redevelopment phase. Where spotters submitted images, surface stones were photographed and archived; those locations represent the clearest ground-truth for impact assessment.

Contractors performing initial assessments should expect discrete impact pockets rather than uniform coverage across the entire warning area. The strongest surface observations clustered near Birch Run and along the Hart Lake Road reports, with later, lighter reports relayed through Ingham County Emergency Management.

What Contractors Should Know