MILLIKEN, Colo. — After an overnight storm pummeled Milliken and communities along the Interstate 25 corridor with hail, Denver7 talked with residents who were preparing for a second round of storms on Tuesday.
Milliken resident Brianna Thomas said hail started raining down around 3 a.m. Tuesday.
"I actually woke up to go to the bathroom," Thomas said. "He always freaks out when there's a storm. My dog was freaking out."
"I saw lightning, not a huge fan of thunder in general, so I decided to sit up and wait until it passed," she continued. "But then all of a sudden I heard clunk, clunk, clunk, clunk, clunk."
Denver7 found Thomas surveying the damage left behind.
"The second they started actually hitting the roof instead of the side of the house, I could hear, like, I could almost visualize how big they were," Thomas said. "It felt like somebody was throwing a baseball or a whole cube on top of the house."
The back windshield of Thomas's car was shattered, while the front windshield of her husband's work truck was cracked.
Once the morning rolled around, Thomas said her sights were set on figuring out what to do next.
"I did call insurance about the auto, and I only have liability, so it's not covered," she said. "It's little things like this that make you think about the kind of coverage you have, and maybe you should up it."
Carole Walker, the executive director for the Rocky Mountain Insurance Association, said this is the time of year when home and vehicle owners should contact their insurance providers to determine what is and isn't covered by their policy.
"For most of us, we have insurance under our homeowners insurance policy and our auto insurance policy, if you have that optional, comprehensive coverage on your vehicle," Walker said. "Now is the time to be doing that insurance checkup. Even today, if you're in the path of this next round of severe storms, talk to your insurance professional about okay, what are my deductibles? How much insurance do I have? And then on that vehicle? So critical for us in hail alley to have that optional, comprehensive coverage on that car. That's what's going to cover you for hail damage, even flood damage."
Walker told Denver7 aside from figuring out what is and isn't covered by your insurance policy, prepping ahead of another storm is ideal.
"If you do have damage from this current storm, it's important to make some temporary repairs to prevent damage from another round of storms," she said. "Also, that will be reimbursable if you do file a claim on your home."
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Thomas said her vehicle's damage wasn't covered by her policy, so all she could do on Tuesday was make sure her vehicle was covered up ahead of the next storm.
"We didn't expect hail like this, but you know, it's always unpredictable," she said. "We'll get through it."
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