TARIJA, Bolivia – A massive thunderstorm that buried the city of Tarija in southern Bolivia in feet of hail left behind damage to buildings and cars around the city.
Mayor Johnny Torres Terzo said he was working to clean up the hail with risk management workers and other first responders who jumped in to help.
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Tarija Mayor Johnny Torres Terzo watches crews scrape up the hail.
(Gobierno Autónomo Municipal de Tarija / FOX Weather)
“This year is an atypical, very problematic year,” Torres Terzo said. “We’ve had fires, now we have ice.”
In the video released by the city on Facebook, people were using shovels to lift the hail from the ground.
Workers scrape the ice up with shovels.
(Gobierno Autónomo Municipal de Tarija / FOX Weather)
In one clip, the mayor holds a meter stick up to the mountain of hail. Though the exact amount of hail is unclear, it measures up to past the mayor’s knee.
A backhoe construction vehicle can be seen scraping the hail up from the ground.
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“There is material damage, there is material damage to homes,” Torres Terzo said. “We in the city have a lot of damage to health infrastructure and sports infrastructure.”
Torres Terzo said the weight of the hail collapsed a shed around the corner.
The roof of a shed collapsed from the weight of the hail.
(Gobierno Autónomo Municipal de Tarija / FOX Weather)
More than 200 people were on the ground helping to clean up, the mayor said.
