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Characteristics of Precipitation

The document discusses the characteristics and forms of precipitation, including rain, snow, hail, fog, dew, and mist. It explains the formation of precipitation, the necessary mechanisms, and the growth of cloud elements, as well as methods for measuring precipitation using various types of rain gauges. Additionally, it differentiates between rain and drizzle based on drop size and describes the phenomenon of freezing rain.

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30 views4 pages

Characteristics of Precipitation

The document discusses the characteristics and forms of precipitation, including rain, snow, hail, fog, dew, and mist. It explains the formation of precipitation, the necessary mechanisms, and the growth of cloud elements, as well as methods for measuring precipitation using various types of rain gauges. Additionally, it differentiates between rain and drizzle based on drop size and describes the phenomenon of freezing rain.

Uploaded by

ayush124816u
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PPTX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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CHARACTERISTICS OF

PRECIPITATION
Contents
1. Introduction.
2. Precipitation forms.
• Rain
• Snow
• Hail
• Fog
• Dew
• Mist/Drizzle
3. Formation of Precipitation.
4. Necessary mechanism to form Precipitation.
5. Formation of cloud elements.
(Droplets/Ice crystals)
6. Growth of cloud elements.
7. Growth of droplets and ice crystals.
8. Measurement of Precipitation.
9. RAIN GAUGES.
10. Types of rain gauges.
• Non recording rain gauges
• Recording rain gauges
11. Types of recording Rain gauges.
• Float type rain gauges
• Tipping bucket type rain gauges
• Weighing type rain gauges
12. Arithmetic Mean Method.
13. Methods for computing Average precipitation
over an area.
• Arithmetic mean method
• Theissen polygon method
• Isohytal method
• Introduction
Moisture entering the atmosphere as a result of evaporation from water and
land surfaces is transported with air fluxes; it condenses and again falls as
precipitation on the surface of the Earth. Total atmospheric moisture is
estimated at 12 to 14 km3 , a volume that would form a water layer 25 mm
thick on the Earth’s surface.

Up to 90% of water vapor is concentrated in the layer up to 5 km. It rapidly


decreases with altitude. Atmospheric moisture turnover is 9 to 10 days, so
this relatively insignificant amount of water plays an important role in
processes occurring on the Earth’s surface. During a year, about 580 000 km3
of water fall from the atmosphere in different forms of precipitation.

Precipitation is the water in a liquid or solid state falling from clouds or


formed on the earth’s surface and ground objects due to condensation of
airborne water vapor. Depending on the mechanism of cloud development
and structure, precipitation may be continuous (temperate-intense) and
produced predominantly from stratocumulus clouds, heavy, from
cumulonimbus, or drizzle, often from stratus clouds.

Precipitation formed on the earth’s surface is called ground hydrometeors


and includes dew, different type of rime, hoarfrost, black and hard frost and
glaze. At meteorological stations, precipitation is measured with rain gauges
of different types, recording rain gauges (pluviographs) or by radar, which
allows estimation of both precipitation fall area and its intensity.

• Precipitation
Forms Precipitation is liquid or solid water falling from clouds to
the Earth’s surface or formed on different bodies as a result of
atmospheric water vapor condensation. Precipitation can be liquid,
solid, or mixed. Liquid precipitation includes rain and drizzle. On
the Earth’s surface or on different objects, liquid precipitation can
be formed as dew or liquid film. Figure 1 shows the mai n types of
precipitation.
Figure 1.
The main types of the
precipitation.
1 - snow;
2 - small hail;
3 - large hail;
4 - ice pellets (graupel);
5 - snow pellets (ice needles,
ice crystals);
6 - droplets of drizzle;
7 - rain drops.
.

Solid precipitation can be of forms that are more diverse.


It falls as snow, hail, snow and ice pellets, ice needles, and
ice crystals. At lower surface temperatures ice forming on
solid objects are solid surface hydrometeors—frost, solid
film, and ice. In free atmosphere, an analogue of such
phenomena is airplane icing, when super-cooled cloud
drops or precipitation freeze on the surface of an
airplane.

• Rain, Drizzle and Freezing rain.


The differentiation between rain and drizzle is to a certain
extent arbitrary. These two forms of liquid precipitation
differ from each other only in the size of drops. The
diameter of raindrops is usually 5 to 6 mm, whereas
drizzle drops are smaller (between 0.2 and 0.5 mm) and
their terminal velocities are between 70 and 200 cm per
second. Drizzle falls mostly from low stratus clouds and is
frequently accompanied with fog and poor visibility
The diameter of raindrops is usually larger than 0.5 mm, but
they only rarely reach 6 mm or more because larger
raindrops are destroyed during falling. Small raindrops are
of almost spherical shape, but bigger ones are flattened
when falling, especially in the lower part of the cloud. The
terminal velocities of rain drops range from two meters per
second for the smallest to about 10 meters per second for
the largest.

During heavy rains, raindrops are considerably bigger than


in light rain. The largest drops of more than six millimeters
in diameter appear only in heavy rains, especially at the
start of a rain storm.

When raindrops pass through cold air layers (below 0 °C),


they become super-cooled, and freezing rain or super-
cooled drizzle occur. Freezing rain falls in liquid form but
freezes upon impact to form a coating of glaze on the
ground and exposed objects. Often these frozen raindrops
form a very slippery and almost transparent “glazed” film
which is dangerous for both pedestrians and transport.

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