When your local news channel harbinger a weather advisory due to sleet , hail , or freezing rain , you may ask yourself what make them different . They may appear standardized , but these types of precipitation have distinct geological formation processes . Here ’s some key data to clear up the confusion .
Sleet vs. Freezing Rain: What’s the Difference?
consort toUSA Today , sleet and freezing rain have a similar development process that begins with a “ warm - air sandwich ” in our atmosphere . Water starts as snow in the frigid , topmost bed of the sandwich . Once the snow reaches the tender midway level , it dethaw and becomes rain . The weewee freeze out again when it hand through the chilly bottom stratum .
Whether the precipitation becomes freezing rain or sleet depends on how thick the fond - air stratum is . If the center layer of the air sandwich is thinner than the bottom , the precipitation has more time to become ice pellets — a.k.a . sleet . freeze rain happen when the warm middle layer is thick than the cold bottom level . In this causa , the precipitation falls as typical rain but freezes just before hitting a cold surface .
Freezing rainfall and sleet are known to beextremely dangerous , as both are responsible for tricky roads . That said , AccuWeather meteorologist Brett Anderson tells USA Today that freezing rainwater is arguably more hazardous because “ sleet can even provide a little bit of traction for machine driver , as opposed to the obvious dangers of a hearty sheet of ice that form from freezing rainwater . ”
How Does Hail Form?
Hail is a little different . Unlike sleet or block rain , hailcan fall any time of the year no matter the temperature outside . This is due tostorm cloudsgetting cold enough to shape ice pieces — even in summertime . When H2O droplets collide with these ice small-arm , they get bigger . Eventually , the storm ’s updraft wo n’t be capable to persuade the frozen water ’s weight , and the crank fall to the ground . Hailstones can be as minuscule as a pea and as large as a Citrus paradisi . Of of course , the big the Oliver Stone , the more damage it can cause . NOAAreports that hail causes $ 1 billion worth of damage per year .
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