Definition of reservoir. 1 : a place where something is kept in store: such asa : an artificial lake where water is collected and kept in quantity for useb : a part of an apparatus in which a liquid is heldc : supply, store a large reservoir of educated people.
All three involve precipitation in the clouds, but each requires just the right set of circumstances to occur. One difference between sleet and hail is the time of year in which each occurs. Typically, hail is most often a summer occurrence, while sleet occurs mostly in winter. Youâre much more likely to see hail in warm and oppressive weather where a sudden thunderstorm occurs.
In order to understand sleet, snow and freezing rain, what we would need is perhaps four to six different temperature readings at different altitudes. Â­Precipitation starts in the cloud as snow. As it falls, it may travel through a layer of air that has a temperature Â­greater than 32 F (0 C). This layer melts the snow into rain. If the temperature at ground level is below freezing, then the water may refreeze in the air, and we get sleet. Or, if the layer of sub-freezing air at ground level is thin, the precipitation falls as rain but then freezes once it touches a freezing object on the ground.