LINCOLN SQUARE — Saturday night's dusting of snow had that Styrofoam (or Dippin' Dots) appearance that looks like the fake snow from movies or TV.
Guess what? It really isn't snow at all, it's a separate form of precipitation known as "graupel."
More commonly called "soft hail" or "snow pellets," graupel is what happens when snow encounters super-cooled water in the atmosphere. When the two come into contact, the water coats the flakes in ice to the point that the original snow crystals are no longer identifiable.
How to tell the different between graupel and other white stuff that falls from the sky?
• Graupel is notably denser and more granular than snow.
• Graupel is more fragile than hail, falls in wintry mixes and has a more oblong shape; hail is more uniformly round and is typically associated with thunderstorms.
Whether graupel or snow, it still makes for a white Christmas out there, but we might need to rethink the lyrics to some of our holiday carols.
Sing it with us Chicago: "Oh the weather outside is frightful, but the fire is so delightful. And since we've no place to go, let it graupel, let it graupel, let it graupel."
Graupel is notably denser and more granular than snow — it looks like Styrofoam. [DNAinfo/Patty Wetli]
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