9 Facts About Winter Weather
Holiday season is coming, people no longer expect you to go outside for no good reason and you can stay indoors all day while watching Netflix and drinking hot chocolate milk. That sounds better than pretty much every party you’ve been to in the last six months, doesn’t it?
To make you even more excited for the winter season, let’s take a look at some amazing winter weather facts.
Table of Contents
- It Can Snow In The Desert
- Temperatures Can Drop Quickly
- The Earth Is Closest To The Sun In Winter
- Wet Snow Works Best For Building A Snowman
- Not All Snowflakes Are Unique
- Snow Falls At 1 To 6 Feet Per Second
- It Doesn’t Take Much Water To Produce A Lot Of Snow
- Every Winter, US Roads Get Covered In 22 Million Tons of Salt
- Most Snow Falls In Aomori City
It Can Snow In The Desert
You might not expect this, but even the Atacama Desert in Chile once received almost 32 inches of snow. And this is one of the driest places on earth!
Temperatures Can Drop Quickly
Don’t use a mild day as an excuse to go out without your winter wear. The biggest cold snap in history saw the temperature (in South Dakota in 1911) drop from 55°F to 8°F in only fifteen minutes.
The Earth Is Closest To The Sun In Winter
This seems a bit weird since it’s the coldest time of the year, but our temperature has nothing to do with our relative distance to the sun. It’s the axis at which the Earth tilts that determines temperature – hence why both hemispheres have summer and winter at different times.
Wet Snow Works Best For Building A Snowman
According to science, the perfect snow-to-water ratio is 5:1.
Not All Snowflakes Are Unique
In fact, two identical snowflakes were documented as far back as 1988! It’s safe to assume there’s been other snowflake twins since then.
Snow Falls At 1 To 6 Feet Per Second
Which is actually quite fast. And this is just for the broad, parachute-like snowflakes. Pellet-like snowflakes drop even faster.
It Doesn’t Take Much Water To Produce A Lot Of Snow
Snow has loads of air in it, which means that pretty much every inch of water can produce about ten inches of snow. That’s a pretty amazing difference, isn’t it?
Every Winter, US Roads Get Covered In 22 Million Tons of Salt
If you calculate this per person, that’s about 137 pounds of salt for every citizen in the United States.
Most Snow Falls In Aomori City
This Japanese city gets plummeted with about 312 inches of snow every year.