This form of precipitation doesn't occur all that often, but it could have fallen in parts of Minnesota yesterday.

I found a Minnesota weather report last year that listed a form of precipitation I'd never heard of-- and I'll bet probably haven't, either.

Being a self-confessed weather geek, I follow several different National Weather Service offices as well as all our local meteorologists. (Heck, I still even follow several meteorologists I used to work with who are now working in markets from Pacific Northwest over to Roanoke, West Virginia.) And with some rain, snow and mixed precip in our forecast for Tuesday night, I was busy checking all my weather sources wondering just how much rain, sleet or snow we were going to get.

But I stumbled on a weather term even I hadn't heard of-- it was something called 'graupel.' I saw it on the Twin Cities' National Weather Service Twitter feed. I didn't know what exactly it was, though it appears to be similar to what I've always called 'sleet'. The National Weather Service La Crosse office cleared it up for me.

They define graupel as "The same as snow pellets or small hail." Okay, that makes sense-- and IS kinda like sleet. This NWS Tweet goes into a little more detail, though: Graupel is "snowflakes that have collected supercooled water droplets on their surface."

Which sounds way cooler, doesn't it. 'Supercooled water'?!? Heck, I'd like to have some of that in the middle of one of our hot, humid days this summer. Sounds refreshing! So, anyway, yeah, if your driveway is anything like mine in northwest Rochester, it could have seen some graupel Tuesday night -- now that I know what it is.

National Weather Service - Twin Cities
National Weather Service - Twin Cities
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Listen to Curt St. John mornings from 6 to 10 a.m. on Quick Country 96.5
and afternoons from 2 to 6 p.m. on 103.9 The Doc

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