The Weekender

Wanting to know what, where, and when we will see all different kinds of precipitation?? Here's your answer!Here is an updated version of the expected snow and ice accumulations.

So why are we seeing so much rain and freezing rain?? Well here's that answer. Temperatures and moisture have to be just right to form snowflakes. Its actually a very complicated process and they don't come from rain droplets freezing. That's sleet or in the summer time its hail. But when you have snow that develops and starts falling through the atmosphere, the entire column of air that the flake travels through must be below freezing for the flake to reach the ground. Well, when you have air that's about 45 degrees, for example, at 5000 feet, then the flake is going to melt into a raindrop. It will then continue to fall through the atmosphere as a raindrop all the way down to the surface. Well, if the surface happens to be below freezing, then that's when you get freezing rain. If you look at the picture below, of the temperatures at 5000 feet, you should notice something pretty quickly.

The temperatures at 5000 feet this evening are well over freezing. In fact, they are in the upper 40's in some spots. That is what melts the snowflakes and causes our freezing rain. Stay safe out there!!

~KDLT Meteorologist Cody Matz