ORCHARD — Funnel clouds and hail made Tuesday night an anxious one in Mitchell County.

Lori Mehmen, who lives on Main Street in Orchard, took a photo from just outside her front door of a large funnel cloud forming shortly after 9 p.m.

“It almost looked like it was going to to take the (grain) elevator,” she said.

The funnel cloud came near the ground just briefly and then went back up in the clouds.

“It was like deja vu,” said Mehmen, who survived the 1968 Charles City tornado.

Funnel clouds also were sighted south of Mitchell and south of Osage. However, authorities say none of the funnel clouds touched the ground.

People in Mitchell County reported hail anywhere from pea-sized to golfball-sized Tuesday night.

One witness who was driving on Highway 9 near the intersection with County Road T28 at around 8:30 p.m. said the hail was coming down so thick and fast it was “just like you were in a blizzard.”

She said the hail stones were as big as 1 inch in diameter. The pile of hail stones on the ground was 2.5 to 3 inches deep.

Another witness said the hail in Osage was pea-sized to quarter-sized.

Pea-sized hail was reported in Worth County, according to a spokeswoman for the Sheriff’s Department.

Ray Huftalin, emergency management coordinator for Mitchell and Worth counties, said during the time the hail was coming down in Osage the temperature dropped from 79 degrees to 36 degrees.

Insurance companies in Osage reported numerous claims Wednesday, mostly from the south and east parts of town and the surrounding areas.

“I haven’t counted how many claims we received, but we’ve been extremely busy,” said Craig Snider of Town & Country Insurance of Osage. “We’ve just been taking the calls and turning them in. Most of the damage reports are coming from the south part of town as well as several east of town.”

Brad E. Smith of Osage’s Shelter Insurance Agency said his office had about 16 or 17 calls concerning damage in town. Of those calls, about 11 were damage to homes. The rest were hail damage to vehicles.

Smith also said all of his calls came from the south part of Osage. “We were up north of town and we didn’t even get much rain there,” he said.

The hail damage just adds to the misery for Mitchell County residents who are still dealing with flood damage.

Huftalin said 124 homes in the county have been affected by the flood.

According to Osage Municipal Utilities, the Osage area received 1.65 inches of rain in just a few hours Tuesday night. More rain is forecast for the next three days.

Hail-damaged crops were reported from Elma to south of Osage, according to Max Brandau, the Farm Bureau crop insurance specialist for Mitchell, Floyd and Chickasaw counties.

Crop damage was particularly heavy between Orchard and Osage, he said.

The hail couldn’t come at a worse time for farmers who already are dealing with flooded fields.

“The hail just adds to the water damage that’s already there,” Brandau said.

David Namanny, editor of the Mitchell County Press News, another Lee Enterprises newspaper, contributed to this report.

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