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© Arvind S. GroverLightning strikes the NYC skyline during Monday night's short, freak storm.
A freak autumn storm turned parts of the city into a winter wonderland on Monday night, pounding some of Brooklyn and Manhattan with hail the size of quarters.

The ferocious front blew in out of the east, hitting the city at about 8:30 p.m. and prompting multiple severe storm warnings and flash flood warnings.

Joann Binns, 61, of Manhattan, said she was pelted by hail a quarter-inch in diameter.

"I started running. There were ice stones," said Binns, who sought shelter under the marquee outside Madison Square Garden. "They hit me and I said, 'I'm outta here.' They hurt."

The storm prompted transit officials to reroute the F subway line and suspend the G line because of station flooding. The wicked weather also delayed the Jets' game against the Minnesota Vikings in the Meadowlands for 45 minutes because of lightning.

In Brooklyn--hit by a destructive tornado only last month--hail piled up on sidewalks and cars, and flash floods left some streets impassable. "It's beautiful, but scary," said Sam Kopp, 35, of Bedford-Stuyvesant. "It sounded like the roof was going to fall in. It's amazing."

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© Joe JacksonBrooklyn takes a beating: The immediate aftermath of the short but incredibly noisy hailstorm.
On St. Johns Place in Park Slope, a 30-foot tree crashed onto a parked Chrysler minivan, blocking the street. "There was ice everywhere," said Gilberto Santana, 42, a window dresser who lives nearby and watched the tree fall. "It was a river in the street almost up to my knees."

The National Weather Service received reports of hail the size of quarters, said meteorologist John Murray. At the height of the storm, Murray said rain was falling at the rate of two inches an hour.