YEAR'S WORTH OF HARD WORK GONE IN HALF AN HOUR Hailstorm ravages Ivanjica villages, farmers desperate

Photo: RINA

After a devastating hailstorm hit villages around the town of Ivanjica in western Serbia, local fruit farmers are assessing the damage done to their properties and orchards.

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The situation is most critical is in the mountain villages of Brusnik, Kovilje and Ercege. Apart from the crops, some roads have also been severely damaged.

"I am 60 years old and have seen many hailstorms and storms, but it seems to me, never like this. Large hailstones were falling for about half an hour and have destroyed almost everything. The yield of raspberries that are in harvest has been halved, onions and potatoes are completely destroyed. We are waiting for members of the commission to come and assess the damage, but this is truly a disaster. You work, you fight, invest, and in half an hour all that effort is gone," a farmer in the village of Ercege told RINA.

Foto: RINA

A lightning strike that hit a substation left a large number of households without electricity, which caused additional problems for the locals.

They say that household appliances, washing machines, refrigerators, short-circuited and then there was a power outage.

Huge damage has been done to road infrastructure as well, approaches to some homes have been completely washed away, which makes it difficult for the locals to go about their daily business.

(Telegraf.rs, RINA)