Archives for: "January 2013"
What makes the thick curvy lines in frozen puddles?
January 27th, 2013My sister recently sent this photo of a frozen puddle, a little over a foot across. Something broke out a piece of ice in the upper right, but it’s mainly a complete glaze over the top. (The white dots are rimed snow crystals. Click to zoom in and see.)… more »
Rime falling from branches
January 24th, 2013While riding my bike home the other day, I saw what appeared to be a patch of light snow. It was the only such patch around. Looking closer, I could see that it consisted not of snow, but of chunks of partly melted rime deposits. (Note how the pieces… more »
Rime, freezing fog, and crystalline spider webs
January 22nd, 2013The Pacific Northwest has been foggy a lot lately, but the fog droplets have been subzero, or supercooled. When such fog droplets hit an object, they almost always freeze. The resulting frozen aggregate is called rime. Freezing fogs make rime. The… more »
Frost Days and Ice Days: Declining Numbers over the Century
January 17th, 2013David Easterling recently reported in BAMS** that the number of frost days per year is decreasing over the US. A frost day is a day in which the minimum temperature goes below the melting temperature of ice (32 F or 0 C). This doesn't sound good for a… more »
Hair Ice on Wood and Pavement
January 16th, 2013The morning after a rapid cool-down, I found hair ice on an alder log. From a distance, it looked unnaturally white, like it was a bit of discarded cotton or white paper, but the closer I got to it, the more incredible it seemed. more »
Crystal-to-crystal “communication” through vapor and heat
January 5th, 2013Two mornings ago, I saw this on the windshield of a parked car. The bulls-eye pattern wasn’t centered on any particular feature on the windshield, and there were similar, though less developed, patterns nearby. See them on the photo below. The dark… more »
