Author: Rainymap

Weather radar can detect snow, but it’s noticeably less reliable at it than at detecting rain, mainly because snowflakes reflect far less energy than raindrops and because the radar beam frequently overshoots shallow winter storm systems entirely. Why Snow Is Harder for Radar to “See” Snowflakes are less dense and reflect radar energy much less…

dBZ (decibels relative to Z) is the unit meteorologists use to measure radar reflectivity, and it’s the actual number behind every color you see on a rain radar map, from light green drizzle to alarming shades of red and purple. What dBZ Actually Measures When a radar pulse hits raindrops, hail, or snowflakes, some of…

If it’s raining outside but your radar map looks clear, the most likely explanation is that the radar beam is scanning well above the rain, the precipitation is too light to register strongly, or the map simply hasn’t refreshed yet. The Radar Beam Isn’t Scanning at Ground Level Weather radar doesn’t look straight down; it…

Doppler radar detects precipitation and wind by sending out pulses of radio waves and measuring how their frequency shifts when they bounce off raindrops, snowflakes, or hail, a phenomenon called the Doppler effect. The Doppler Effect, in Plain Terms You’ve heard the Doppler effect before, even if you didn’t know the name: it’s why a…