Facts About Snow – 25 Fun Snow Facts That Will WOW You!

Are you curious to learn some weird and wonderful facts about Snow?

If so, excellent! You are in exactly the right place my friend…

It’s time to chat about Snow facts.

Let’s dive right in…

Facts about Snow

1 – Snow is a meteorological event that happens when air temperature drops below freezing and moisture in the air freezes into ice crystals. Snow is a type of precipitation that falls from the sky.

2 – The average snowfall per year in North America is 12 inches (30 cm) or 3 inches (8 cm) per day during winter months.

3 – Snow is created when water vapor in the air turns into ice.

4 – The word “snow” comes from the Old Norse word “snjór” which means snow.

5 – The earliest known use of the word was recorded by an Anglo-Saxon scholar named Wulfstan who wrote it down as “snawe” or “sneowe.

More Facts about Snow

6 – There are seven main types of snow crystals including: plates, needles, capped columns, irregular forms, stellar crystals, spatial dendrites, and columns.

7 – Snowflakes start to form when tiny ice crystals clump together in the sky. When two flakes collide they often will create an entirely new shape or design.

8 – A single snowflake can weigh between one to five milligrams.

9 – Snowstorms are caused by changes in wind direction or speed which causes a stormy flow of cold air over warmer ground.

10 – There are two types of snows – light fluffy (wet) and heavy wet (powdery).

More Facts about Snow

11 – Snow usually falls at a speed of 1 mile to 4 miles an hour.

12 – Snow has been recorded as being present on all 7 continents – Antarctica included!

13 – There are two types of snow – wet and dry. Wet snow is usually less dense than dry snow because it contains more moisture (2 to 3 times more water).

Dry snow melts faster because it’s lighter than wet, or “warm” snow.

14 – The largest snowball in the world was created by students from ASME Michigan Technological University in USA. It was 3.2 metres wide and 3.28 metres tall.

15 – A person who creates snow sculptures is called an “ice carver.”

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16 – The average snowflake weighs about 10,000 times less than a nickel.

17 – A blizzard is defined as a severe snowstorm with winds exceeding 35 mph (56 km/h) or heavy snow falling for at least four hours, accompanied by strong wind gusts or reduced visibility often caused by blowing snow.

18 – The earliest snow on record was in 1836, when it snowed from April to October.

19 – There is a type of algae that turns the color of snow green.

20 – In 1979, a blizzard dumped 8 feet of snow in one day in New York City and 10 inches fell in just two hours.

More Facts About Snow

21 – New York City averages around 25 inches of snow each year.

22 – A cubic foot (12″x12″) of snow weighs about 50 kilograms.

23 – The snowiest place in the world is Aomori City in Japan which gets around 312 feet of snow each year.

24 – The greatest snowfall for a one day (24 hour period) in this world happened at Capracotta Italy on March 5, 2015. The snowfall was 100.8 inches.

25 – The first person credited with observing a snowflake was Johannes Kepler in 1611.

Snowflakes are unique with six sides or points, in a hexagonal shape.

The scientific term for snow is “crystals of ice.”

The average depth of snow ranges from 1 inch to 3 feet depending on how long it stays on the ground and where you are located.

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