When hail goes, the roof and drainpipes shake from a terrible rumble, the hail can cause destruction. In a short time, such an abundant hail may fall that it covers the earth completely.
Rough streams endure after a strong hail ice accumulations of length and width up to two meters. Small gradients are often round.. They fall to the ground like small billiard balls. But it happens that the shape of hailstones has unusual shapes: either the sun with rays, then the frozen letter "X". Different forms are caused by the wind blowing high in the air forming a hail.
The biggest hailstones
The largest hailstorm ever seen fell in September 1970 near Coffeyville, Kansas. It was more than 40 centimeters in diameter, weighed about 800 grams, ice spikes protruded from it in different directions. This shapeless piece of ice resembled a medieval deadly weapon.
How does hail arise?
Storm clouds are real hail factories. Powerful streams of air carry dust, sand and other small particles inside a thundercloud. A hailstorm is formed when pieces of ice adhere to particles moving through the air inside a cloud. In some hailstones, such a particle may be dead insects.
The hailstorm is growing more and more, as more and more ice sticks to the ice-born “ship” that rushes without a helm and without sails on a thundercloud.If you split the hail, you can trace the history of her birth. On the fault, rings are visible, like rings on a stump marking the growth stages of the hailstones. One layer is transparent, the other is milky cloudy, the next again transparent and so on.
Interesting fact: hailstones weighing about 800 grams fell in 1970.
What is the reason for the difference in the structure of the gradi layers?
When the ice on the hail freezes quickly (at a very low temperature). To carry a hail of hail with a diameter of about 10 centimeters in the air, ascending air jets in a thundercloud must have a speed of at least 200 kilometers, snowflakes and air bubbles are included in it. Such a layer looks cloudy. But if the temperature is higher, then the ice freezes more slowly, and the included snowflakes have time to melt, and the air disappears. Therefore, such a layer of ice is transparent. You can trace through the rings in which layers of the cloud the hailstorm visited before falling to the ground.
How does hail get big?
A hailstorm grows, flying up and down the cloud. During this time, it becomes harder and harder. It is clear that in order for the hail to become heavier, the wind in the cloud must be very strong. For example, for a hail to grow to 10 centimeters in diameter, the wind speed should be at least 200 kilometers per hour. These powerful streams of air carry hail until its weight becomes such that the wind will no longer be able to support it in a suspended state. Now the hail is falling to the ground.
Since gradients grow only inside the clouds, the thicker the thundercloud, the more likely it is to drop hail.The probability of hail from a thundercloud 12 kilometers thick is 50 percent. If the cloud is 2 kilometers thicker, then the chances increase to 75 percent. Well, if the cloud thickness is 18 kilometers, then the hail will be for sure.
Shower shade with hail
Rain with hail may have a greenish tint. Why? White sunlight is made up of rainbow colors, or from a spectrum: red, orange, green, blue, blue and violet. Hailstones mainly reflect green light from the spectrum of the sun's rays, so clouds with hail have an ominous greenish tint.
