This is what democracy looks like. In a hail storm.

The heavens opened up in the last half hour before the polls closed in Denver, but voters kept voting and poll workers kept working.

Kevin Beaty

Jun. 29, 2016, 10:15 am

2 min. read

A sign for drive-up ballot-casting flails like paper in the winds of a massive, sudden summer hail storm. (Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite) hail; storm; rain; cowx; election; ballot; vote; denver; colorado; denverite; kevinjbeaty;

Neither rain nor hail nor wind nor street flooding stayed these foot soldiers of democracy from their duties Tuesday night. The heavens opened up in the last half hour before the polls closed in Denver, but voters kept voting and the dedicated employees of the Denver Elections Division made sure their votes counted.

Here are some scenes from that stormy night.

Tim Drago, a support judge, braves a roaring hailstorm to collect ballots from passing voters. (Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite)

Ted Jefferson takes a quickly passed ballot amidst a summer hailstorm right before polls closed. (Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite)

Ted Jefferson, an election judge, watches hail pour from the sky from the covered entrance to the Denver Elections Division on Bannock and 14th. (Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite)

Hail pelts 14th street at Bannock during the final hour of voting on June 28, 2016. (Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite)

Drenched election materials during the final hour of voting on June 28, 2016. (Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite)

Damp and disheveled ballots from a raging evening hail storm. (Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite)

Richard Bettinger, a ballot reception staffer and self-described "flunky," unlocks a ballot box straight from a polling station. (Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite)

Ballot operations assistants stack ballots into a machine that will strip a sticker from the envelope and scan the signature beneath for individual verification. (Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite)

Ballot operations assistant Dan Mock works behind an automated signature scanner that processes nearly every one of the votes cast in Denver. (Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite)

Automated signature scanner processes in action. (Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite)

Ballot signature verifiers scan through thousands of scrawls scanned into a central system. (Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite)

Kevin Beaty

Kevin is a multimedia artist who flung himself into the world of journalism. He likes using a camera and microphone to tell stories about workers, the environment, social justice and fascinating humans.