We know that not all clouds produce rain that strikes the ground. Some may produce rain or snow that evaporates before reaching the ground, and most clouds produce no precipitation at all.
Clouds are made of water droplets. Within a cloud, water droplets condense onto one another, causing the droplets to grow. When these water droplets get too heavy to stay suspended in the cloud, they fall to Earth as rain. Come to think of it, what makes it snow, hail, and sleet ? All these forms of water don’t fall out of a clear, blue sky.
It should be noted that condensation by itself does not cause precipitation (rain, snow, sleet, hail). The moisture in clouds must become heavy enough to succumb to gravity and return to earth’s surface. This occurs through two processes. In cold clouds ice crystals and water droplets exist side by side.
Another common inquiry is “What makes it rain?”.
What causes rain? Clouds are made of water droplets. Within a cloud, water droplets condense onto one another, causing the droplets to grow. When these water droplets get too heavy to stay suspended in the cloud, they fall to Earth as rain. Come to think of it, what makes it snow, hail, and sleet?
Why do clouds look dark before rain?
Clouds appears black :. In th atmosphere any object’s colour is dependent on the ability to reflect wavelengths of light. When an object does not reflect any colour, it appears black. Thayswhy tiny droplets of water in rain clouds: Scatter the white light of the sun. Red is scattered first, and violet the last. At high altitude no rays of the sun reach the bottom of the cloud., and more items.
These clouds are not actually behind the sun, rather this is an optical illusion caused by the way cameras pick up light. This is fully explained on the webpage I linked below, but I will give a summary. Cameras have a limit to how bright of a light they can see. Some clouds let more light through than others .
The answer is that this is why, storm clouds are dark black or grey. Explanation: Most clouds appear white, because sunlight reflects off the water droplets. If the clouds are thick, the droplets scatter or absorb the light and less solar radiation can travel through them. This is why, storm clouds are dark black or grey.
What happens to clouds when they get too heavy?
When they get too heavy to stay suspended in the cloud, even with updrafts within the cloud, they fall to Earth as rain. If the air in the cloud is below the freezing point (32 °F or 0 °C), ice crystals form; if the air all the way down to the ground is also freezing or below, you get snow.
The next thing we asked ourselves was, why do clouds float on water?
I however, explaining the different types of clouds is beyond the scope of this article. The rising warm air beneath these broad areas of water vapor is also strong enough to support the clouds, which is why they appear to “float”, along with all of the rain that they contain.