PRECIPITATION

PROCESS, TYPES & MEASUREMENT

John Lloyd P. Alarcon
PRECIPITATION PROCESS
Cloudy weather does not necessarily mean that it will rain or
snow. In fact, clouds may form, linger for many days, and
never produce precipitation.
Condensation begins on tiny particles called condensation
nuclei. The growth of cloud droplets by condensation is slow
and, even under ideal conditions, it would take several days
for this process alone to create a raindrop.
 PRECIPITATION PROCESS
COLLISION-COALESCENCE PROCESS
The speed of the falling drop increases until the air resistance
equals the pull of gravity. At this point, the drop continues to
fall, but at a constant speed, which is called its terminal
velocity
Larger drops fall faster than smaller drops.
Large droplets overtake and collide with smaller drops in their
path. This merging of cloud droplets by collision is called
coalescence.
PRECIPITATION PROCESS
COLLISION-COALESCENCE PROCESS
PRECIPITATION PROCESS
COLLISION-COALESCENCE PROCESS
The most important factor in the production
of raindrops is the cloud’s liquid water
content. In a cloud with sufficient water,
other significant factors are:
1. the range of droplet sizes
2. the cloud thickness
3. the updrafts of the cloud
4. the electric charge of the droplets and
the electric field in the cloud
PRECIPITATION PROCESS
ICE-CRYSTAL PROCESS
It proposes that both ice crystals and liquid cloud droplets
must co-exist in clouds at temperatures below freezing.
Water droplets existing at temperatures below freezing are
referred to as supercooled droplets.
Ice crystals may form in subfreezing air if there are ice-
forming particles present called ice nuclei.
PRECIPITATION PROCESS
ICE-CRYSTAL PROCESS

The distribution of ice

and water in a
cumulonimbus cloud.
PRECIPITATION PROCESS
ICE-CRYSTAL PROCESS
THE ICE-CRYSTAL (BERGERON) PROCESS
(1) The greater number of water
vapor molecules around the liquid
droplet causes water molecules to
diffuse from the liquid droplet
toward the ice crystal.
(2) The ice crystal absorbs the
water vapor and grows larger,
(3) the water droplet grows
smaller.
PRECIPITATION PROCESS
ICE-CRYSTAL PROCESS
 PRECIPITATION PROCESS
ICE-CRYSTAL PROCESS
Accretion - the process of ice crystals growing larger as they
collide with supercooled cloud droplets.
Graupel or snow pellets - the icy matter that forms

Snowflake - As the ice crystal fall, they may collide and stick
to one another, forming an aggregate of ice crystals
PRECIPITATION PROCESS
CLOUD SEEDING
Cloud seeding is to inject (or seed) a
cloud with small particles that will act as
nuclei, so that the cloud particles will
grow large enough to fall to the surface
as precipitation.
PRECIPITATION PROCESS
CLOUD SEEDING
Vincent Schaefer and Irving Langmuir (1940)
To seed a cloud, they dropped crushed pellets of dry ice
(solid carbon dioxide) from a plane.
Dry ice pellets fall through the cloud, they quickly
cool the air around them. This cooling causes the air
around the pellet to become supersaturated. In this
supersaturated air, water vapor forms directly into many
tiny cloud droplets.
PRECIPITATION PROCESS
CLOUD SEEDING
Bernard Vonnegut (1947)
demonstrated that silver iodide (AgI) could be used as a
cloud-seeding agent.
Silver iodide causes ice crystals to form in two primary ways:
1. Ice crystals form when silver iodide crystals come in
contact with supercooled liquid droplets.
2. Ice crystals grow in size as water vapor deposits onto
the silver iodide crystal.
PRECIPITATION PROCESS
PRECIPITATION IN CLOUDS
In cold, strongly convective clouds, precipitation may
begin only minutes after the cloud forms, and may
be initiated by either the collision-coalescence or the
ice-crystal (Bergeron) process. Once either process
begins, most precipitation growth is by accretion, as
supercooled liquid droplets
freeze on impact with snowflakes and ice crystals
 PRECIPITATION TYPES
R A I N
Most people consider rain to be any falling drop of liquid
water. To the meteorologist, however, that falling drop must
have a diameter equal to, or greater than, 0.5 mm (0.02 in.)
to be considered rain
Drizzle - fine uniform drops of water whose diameters are
smaller than 0.5 mm
Virga - the streaks of falling precipitation that evaporate
before reaching the ground.
 PRECIPITATION TYPES
R A I N
Rain Shower - the suspended drops will fall to the ground.
It is usually brief and sporadic, as the cloud moves overhead
and then drifts on by .
Cloudburst - If the shower is excessively heavy
Acid rain - when rain combines with gaseous pollutants,
such as oxides of sulfur and nitrogen, it becomes acidic.
PRECIPITATION TYPES
S N O W
In summer, the freezing level is
usually high and the
snowflakes falling from a cloud
melt before reaching the
surface. In winter, however, the
freezing level is much lower,
and falling snowflakes have a
better chance of survival.
 PRECIPITATION TYPES
S N O W
Fallstreaks - when ice crystals and snowflakes fall from high
cirrus clouds
Sublimation - as the ice particles fall into drier air, they
usually disappear as they change from ice into vapor

Dendrite - most common snowflake form is

a fernlike branching shape
 PRECIPITATION TYPES
S N O W
Flurries - these are usually light showers that fall
intermittently for short durations and produce only light
accumulations
Snow Squall - more intense snow shower
Drifting snow - usually accompanied by blowing snow
 PRECIPITATION TYPES
S N O W
Blizzard - is a weather condition characterized by low
temperatures and strong winds bearing large amounts of
fine, dry, powdery particles of snow, which can reduce
visibility to only a few meters
Ground Blizzard - the combination of drifting and
blowing snow, after falling snow has ended
PRECIPITATION TYPES
SLEETING & FREEZING RAIN

Sleet forms when a

partially melted
snowflake or a cold
raindrop freezes into a
pellet of ice before
reaching the ground.
 PRECIPITATION TYPES
SLEETING & FREEZING RAIN
Freezing Rain – when the precipitation is spread out and
almost immediately freeze, forming a thin veneer of ice.
Freezing drizzle - If the precipitation drops are quite small

Rime – super cooled cloud or fog droplets

strike an object whose temperature is below
freezing, the tiny droplets freeze, forming an
accumulation of white or milky granular ice
 PRECIPITATION TYPES
SLEETING & FREEZING RAIN
Black Ice - The tiny liquid droplets freeze on contact to road
surfaces or pavements, producing a sheet of ice that often
appears relatively dark.

Ice Storms - when there is a

substantial accumulation of
freezing rain - destructive
weight of the ice
 PRECIPITATION TYPES
SNOW GRAINS & SNOW PELLETS
Snow grains - are small, opaque grains of ice, the
solid equivalent of drizzle. They fall in small
quantities from stratus clouds, and never in the form
of a shower.
Snow pellets - are white, opaque grains of ice
about the size of an average raindrop
 PRECIPITATION TYPES
SNOW GRAINS & SNOW PELLETS

Graupel - when the ice particle accumulates a heavy coating of rime

Tapioca Snow - the accumulation of snow pellets sometimes gives the
appearance of tapioca
Soft hail - graupel that reaches the ground when the freezing level is
well above the surface,
PRECIPITATION TYPES
H A I L

Hailstones are pieces of ice

either transparent or partially
opaque, ranging in size from that
of small peas to that of golf balls
or larger
PRECIPITATION TYPES
H A I L
Hailstones begin as embryos
(usually ice particles called
graupel) that remain suspended in
the cloud by violent updrafts. The
ice particles eventually grow large
enough and heavy enough to fall
toward the ground as hailstones
MEASURING PRECIPITATION
INSTRUMENTS
Rain Gauge - any instrument that can
collect and measure rainfall
Standard Rain Gauge - consists of a
funnel-shaped collector attached to a long
measuring tube
Trace - an amount of rainfall less than one-
hundredth of an inch
MEASURING PRECIPITATION
INSTRUMENTS
Tipping Bucket is the rain gauge used in
the automated (ASOS) weather stations.
Gauge has a receiving funnel leading to two
small metal collectors (buckets). The bucket
beneath the funnel collects the rainwater.
When it accumulates the equivalent of one-
hundredth of an inch of rain, the weight of
the water causes it to tip and empty itself.
MEASURING PRECIPITATION
INSTRUMENTS
Remote recording of precipitation can also be made
with a weighing-type rain gauge.
The bucket sits on a sensitive weighing platform.
Special gears translate the accumulated weight of rain
or snow into millimeters or inches of precipitation.
Water equivalent is the depth of water that would result
from the melting of a snow sample.
MEASURING PRECIPITATION
DOPPLER RADAR

Radar has become an essential tool of the atmospheric

scientist, for it gathers information about storms and
precipitation in previously inaccessible regions.
Atmospheric scientists use radar to
examine the inside of a cloud much like physicians use
X-rays to examine the inside of a human body.
MEASURING PRECIPITATION
DOPPLER RADAR
A microwave pulse is sent out from the radar
transmitter. The pulse strikes raindrops and a
fraction of its energy is reflected back to the
radar unit, where it is detected and displayed
Target - a fraction of the energy is
scattered back toward the transmitter and is
detected by a receiver
The brightness of the echo is directly related
to the amount of rain falling in the cloud.
MEASURING PRECIPITATION
DOPPLER RADAR
Doppler radar (1990) replaced the conventional radar
units that were put into service shortly after World War II.
Doppler radar is like conventional radar in that it can detect
areas of precipitation and measure rainfall intensity
Using special computer programs called algorithms, the
rainfall intensity, over a given area for a given time, can be
computed and displayed as an estimate of total rainfall over
that particular area
MEASURING PRECIPITATION
DOPPLER RADAR
Doppler radar uses the principle called
Doppler shift, it has the capacity to measure the speed
at which falling rain is moving horizontally toward or
away from the radar antenna.
The Doppler shift is the change in the frequency of waves that occurs when
the emitter or the observer is moving toward or away from the other

Polari metric radar - form of Doppler radar transmits both

a vertical and horizontal pulse that will make it easier to
determine whether falling precipitation is in the form of
rain or snow.
MEASURING PRECIPITATION
MEASURING PRECIPITATION FROM SPACE
TRMM (Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission)
satellite is able to measure rainfall intensity in
previously inaccessible regions of the tropics and
subtropics.
The onboard Precipitation Radar is capable of
detecting rainfall rates down to about 0.7 mm
(0.03 in.) per hour, while at the same time
providing vertical prof les of rain and snow
intensity from the surface up to
about 20 km (12 mi).
MEASURING PRECIPITATION
MEASURING PRECIPITATION FROM SPACE
Microwave Imager complements the
Precipitation Radar by measuring emitted
microwave energy from the earth, the
atmosphere, clouds, and precipitation, which
is translated into rainfall rates.
The Visible and Infrared Scanner (VIS)
onboard the satellite measures visible and
infrared energy from the earth, the
atmosphere, and clouds.
MEASURING PRECIPITATION
MEASURING PRECIPITATION FROM SPACE
CloudSat satellite (April, 2006)
a very sensitive radar (called the Cloud Profiling Radar, or CPR) is
able to peer into a cloud and provide a vertical view of its tiny cloud
droplets and ice particles.
It provide scientists with a better understanding of precipitation
processes that go on inside the cloud and the role that clouds play
in the earth’s global climate system.