How rain, snow, sleet, and hail form, and the atmospheric conditions that determine each type, one concept per card.
30 cards · basic cards · AI-written, checked twice. Edit anything.
- What is precipitation?
- Water falling from clouds to Earth's surface.
- What is condensation?
- The process where water vapor cools and becomes liquid water.
- What role does water vapor play in precipitation formation?
- It is the invisible water gas that rises, cools, and condenses into cloud droplets.
- How do clouds form?
- Water vapor rises and cools, then condenses around tiny particles in the air.
- What is the freezing level?
- The altitude where temperature reaches 32 degrees Fahrenheit (0 degrees Celsius).
- How does temperature determine the type of precipitation?
- Different types form in different temperature layers of the atmosphere as water falls.
- What is an updraft?
- A rising column of warm air carrying moisture upward through the atmosphere.
- What is a downdraft?
- A descending column of cool or cold air moving downward through the atmosphere.
- Define rain.
- Liquid water droplets falling from clouds.
- What atmospheric conditions produce rain?
- Warm air throughout the cloud and below, with water droplets large enough to fall.
- Define snow.
- Ice crystals falling from clouds.
- How do snowflakes form?
- Water vapor freezes directly into ice crystals (deposition) in sub-freezing clouds.
- Define sleet.
- Small, translucent pellets of ice that bounce when they land.
- How does sleet form?
- Rain falls through a freezing air layer and turns into ice pellets before reaching the ground.
- Define hail.
- Balls or chunks of ice much larger than sleet, formed by multiple freeze-thaw cycles.
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