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I was wondering what makes the snow flakes bigger sometimes? I noticed sometimes when it snows like today the flakes are huge.
Thanks again.. Dana
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Snowflakes definitely are one of nature's neatest ways of bringing us precipitation. They can vary from small to big and fat and every snowflake is different!
Snowflakes are made of ice crystals, these usually aren't bigger than a half an inch. However, you can get several stuck together, then you have what looks like big flakes, but it's really just a bunch all grouped up.
When we have colder temperatures below freezing in much of the tropopshere (the layer of the atmosphere where weather happens), the snow can sometimes be called a "dry snow" or the flakes are smaller. When you try to throw a snowball at your friends, it doesn't work, and the snowball falls apart in your hand. These flakes tend to be smaller.
When temperatures are near or just above freezing, the snow flake will melt a tiny bit, so other snowflakes can stick to it. This is called aggregation. It makes for good snowball snow as my brothers would call it before they threw about 30 of them in my direction. Also, the snowflakes will stick together, so your overall snowflake will look larger even though it's made up of lots of flakes or ice crystals.
The limits on snowflakes is poorly defined, they can stick to others and grow as big as a silver dollar. It's difficult to say what the largest snowflake has ever been, but some people claim to have seen them as large as baseballs.
Answered by KSL Meteorologist Dina Freedman
