Hailstorm smashes plane's cockpit window and nose cone (video)

An Alitalia plane was forced to make an emergency landing in Naples after a "violent hailstorm" left the nose cone and one of the cockpit windshields shattered.

One passenger managed to take a video from inside the plane, from where a few unnerved screams can be heard at first.

See also: 15 flights we're glad we weren't on

Flight AZ2016 left Rome's main airport of Fiumicino on Wednesday morning at 8.30am, bound for Milan.

However, the storm was so bad the plane diverted to Naples's Capodichino airport, where passengers disembarked.

An Alitalia spokesman said the plane flew into "an extraordinary and violent hailstorm" just minutes after take-off from Rome, reports Weather.com.

Shane Egan, who had been on a different flight, captured a picture of the storm-hit plane and shared it on Twitter.

The incident was reported on Air Live, which said: "An Alitalia Airbus A319 took off at 08:25 LT from Rome to Milan.

The plane, registration EI-IML, with 111 passengers on board, crossed hail storm that seriously damaged the unit cockpit windshields and totally destroyed the nose radome.

"The plane climbed to 14,000ft then started to descent at 08:40 to divert to Naples where it landed safely at 09:10."

The Daily Mail reports that some passengers were left so shaken they decided to get a bus to Milan instead.

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