People are sharing their incredible photos of rare freezing rain phenomenon

This week Britain has been hit by cold temperatures, snow and wind – with red alerts being issued from the Met Office.

However, the UK is also facing another weather-related issue – in the form of freezing rain.

So the question is, how does rain freeze?

According to the Met Office, freezing rain “is a type of liquid precipitation that falls as a supercooled water droplet until it strikes a cold surface, at which point it freezes almost instantly”.

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“Freezing rain tends to start its life as snow, ice, sleet or hail, but passes through a layer of air that’s above 0C on the way down to the ground, melting into a liquid water droplet. If these droplets then fall through a zone of sub-zero air just above the ground, they become supercooled.

“When these supercooled droplets strike surfaces that are close to or below freezing, they freeze on impact forming a glaze of ice.”

The Met Office said that because of the specific conditions needed for freezing rain to occur, this phenomenon is quite rare in the UK.

People have been sharing their photos and videos of their frozen rain experiences, and needless to say, some of them are very bizarre!

1.

Mark McCarthy said: “The blossom is from my almond tree. The cherry and apple tree in the other shots are more sensibly still dormant, I may not be getting many almonds this year!”

2.

Rebecca Williams shared this video of her car window freezing over in Taunton.

3.

Ele Hunt shared this amazing photo of ice that had frozen around a leaf.

4.

Ice drips off this tree, captured by Dave Gibson.

5.

This incredible frozen rain video was taken by Jason Bradley.

6.

Charlotte shared her blurry view of the frozen rain.