Trees, buildings, and animals were pounded by “hail the size of tennis balls” for about 15 minutes last night in Kyun Hla Township, Sagaing Region. A cow and 600 chickens were killed by the hailstorm.

“We are now compiling a record of the damage,” township administrator Than Lwin told Eleven. “Two villages – Hteintaw and Yabin – were damaged. In Hteintaw Village, the roofs of 30 homes, schools, monasteries, and rural healthcare centers were blown away. In Yabin village, hailstones destroyed the roofs of nearly 50 houses. There were no [human] casualties.”

Local administrators, police, and members of parliament are now working to secure aid for the ice-battered community.

“It is now harvesting time, so thankfully, our crops weren’t damaged. However, chickens were killed,” said Than Lwin.

Death and injury by hailstorm are relatively common among livestock. According to Slate, “Animals that don’t have [the luxury of being indoors] tend to die in greater numbers. Individual hailstorms have killed dozens of horses and hundreds of chickens at a time in the United States. An 1888 storm in India is said to have wiped out more than 1,600 animals.”

However, humans are not immune to the dangers of hail. The same Slate author recounts: “A few years ago, the Chinese government reported that at least seven people in Zhengzhou died in a storm of ‘egg-sized’ hail. Dozens more ended up in the hospital. In Bangladesh, a giant storm of ‘grapefruit-sized’ hail killed almost a hundred people in 1986. Some of the stones weighed more than two pounds.”

RIP little chickens.