Weather Tidbits: Melting Snow vs Sleet

We’ll be discussing the melting of snow versus the melting of sleet and ice in this edition of Weather Tidbits. Snow and sleet both have different rates of melting do to their different structures. Snowflakes are very delicate and contain a low liquid density. They are not as dense as sleet pellets. Sleet pellets have a much higher liquid density since they are a ball of ice. Due to this different structure, it takes longer to melt sleet than it is snow, since it takes a lot of energy to change a phase from a solid to a gas. This is why sleet or ice-covered snow from freezing rain will typically remain on the ground for longer than pure snowpack of the same depth.