Can freezing rain still occur if the temperature is above 32 degrees?

Answer 1

Hi, indeed it can!
When water is undercooled below 0°C ( or 32°F) than it will freeze instanteanously when it comes in contact with other material. The undercooled state occurs when the temperature of water is lowered very slowly .

Undercooling is a tremendously fascinating process. If done right, you can actually take a liquid and lower its temperature below the normal freezing point yet still keep the liquid from freezing!!! This is undercooling.

What's even more interesting is that when you do allow the undercooled liquid to freeze, it forms a kind of material that is very different from the "normally" frozen material!

Whether you know it or not, you have probably seen an undercooled, then rapidly solidified liquid many times - sometimes it's several feet deep in your driveway: SNOW.

Snowflakes occur when undercooled water falls through the atmosphere, eventually striking another drop of water or piece of dust in the air that causes it to rapidly solidify into a beautiful snowflake structure.

We're also aware that snowflakes are very different from regular ice, although both are made of frozen water. This difference comes from the way in which the water was frozen, one from the normal state, one from the undercooled state. And as you know, if you leave snowflakes alone, they eventually turn into regular ice. The "snowflake state" is only partially stable, or metastable.

You also might have heard of ice-rain, a v ery dangerous wheather condition. It`a nightmare for sailing boats on the ocean, because in parts of seconds the whole boat with all the riggings and sails are covered with a thick ice layer and everything will break down because of the heavy load.

It`s also very dangerous to traffic in the country. The roads and cars are affected in the same way as the boats I mentioned before.

So you see, undercooled water is an extremely important state of water.

Answer 2

Yes. Upper atmospheric temperatures will be colder than those at ground level. Freezing rain can form and fall, but will not remain frozen at ground level...at least for very long.

Answer 3

yes it can. Just because the temperature on the ground is above freezing, does not mean the temperature is the same high above.

Answer 4

i think if the wind chill is below 32 degrees, otherwise no