weather 101
With all the crazy weather going on, i thought i'd shed some info to
clear up the "it's hailing outside, no it's sleeting dilemma.
Hail is a large frozen raindrop produced by intense thunderstorms, where
snow and rain can coexist in the central updraft. As the snowflakes
fall, liquid water freezes onto them forming ice pellets that will
continue to grow as more and more droplets are accumulated. Upon
reaching the bottom of the cloud, some of the ice pellets are carried by
the updraft back up to the top of the
storm.
As the ice pellets once again fall through the cloud, another layer of
ice is added and the hail stone grows even larger. Typically the
stronger the updraft, the more times a hail stone repeats this cycle and
consequently, the larger it grows. Once the hail stone becomes too heavy
to be supported by the updraft, it falls out of the cloud toward the
surface. The hail stone reaches the ground as ice since it is not in the
warm air below the thunderstorm long enough to melt before reaching the
ground.
SLEET
Also known as ice pellets, it is winter precipitation in the form
of small bits or pellets of ice that
rebound after striking the ground or any other hard surface. It
is formed by rain drops descending into a cold layer of air and the
freezing into ice pellets.
Glenn
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