Enroute controller described a weather encounter that prompted an immediate descent because of hail ...

Narrative:

I received the hand off from approach and saw that the aircraft had routing through an area of extreme precipitation. I informed the pilot of the area of weather and told him to let me know if he needed to deviate. He said he would appreciate vectors to the left of the weather. I told him he was cleared to deviate to the left and direct when able. The aircraft was going through the very bottom portion of the weather we showed on the scope when I got relieved. In my briefing I mentioned that the weather must have moved from what we showed since he was going right through it. The relieving controller had barely got settled when the C402 began a precipitous descent. He went down about 1;500 ft and said he had just encountered severe hail and had a cracked ice viewing shield. While the r-side got information from the pilot; I got onto the d-side and coordinated with approach for a divert. The pilot said that he was in the clear when the hail began. The aircraft had dents on the leading edges of the wings and the nose in addition to the cracked ice viewing shield. The pilot did not declare an emergency or request equipment at the airport. He did land safely.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: Enroute Controller described a weather encounter that prompted an immediate descent because of hail and resulted in an emergency with aircraft damage.

Narrative: I received the hand off from Approach and saw that the aircraft had routing through an area of extreme precipitation. I informed the pilot of the area of weather and told him to let me know if he needed to deviate. He said he would appreciate vectors to the left of the weather. I told him he was cleared to deviate to the left and direct when able. The aircraft was going through the very bottom portion of the weather we showed on the scope when I got relieved. In my briefing I mentioned that the weather must have moved from what we showed since he was going right through it. The relieving Controller had barely got settled when the C402 began a precipitous descent. He went down about 1;500 FT and said he had just encountered severe hail and had a cracked ice viewing shield. While the R-Side got information from the pilot; I got onto the D-Side and coordinated with Approach for a divert. The pilot said that he was in the clear when the hail began. The aircraft had dents on the leading edges of the wings and the nose in addition to the cracked ice viewing shield. The pilot did not declare an emergency or request equipment at the airport. He did land safely.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of July 2013 and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.

Attributes
ACN	1028755
Time
Date	201208
Local Time Of Day	0001-0600
Place
Locale Reference	ZZZ.ARTCC
State Reference	US
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	Cessna 402/402C/B379 Businessliner/Utiliner
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 91
Flight Phase	Cruise
Route In Use	Direct Vectors
Flight Plan	IFR
Person 1
Function	Enroute
Qualification	Air Traffic Control Fully Certified
Events
Anomaly	Aircraft Equipment Problem Critical Inflight Event / Encounter Weather / Turbulence

Enroute controller described a weather encounter that prompted an immediate descent because of hail and resulted in an emergency with aircraft damage.