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by wickedwillie on May 28th, 2005

wickedwillie

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Why does snow make a crunchy sound when you step on it?

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  • by wickedwillie on May 28th, 2005

    wickedwillie

    Snow is made of ice crystals. Ice crystals have six points. One snowflake can consist of multiple crystals. There are gaps between the points of a crystal that are empty, except for air. When snow falls to the ground, air is trapped inside of that layer of snow. You have probably noticed that when snow is stepped on, it gets compressed. The air gets pushed out of the snow. The sound you hear could be the sound of the ice crystals as they break. Try it with ice cubes. They make a crunching sound when they are broken.

    Also, on a sunny day, the surface layer of snow can melt, due to thermal heating. When the sun goes down and temperatures drop, that top layer refreezes into a thin crust of ice. If you step on it, you are breaking that top crust, resulting in a "crunching" sound.

    The crunching sound is less related to temperature and more related to the structure of the snow. The older the snow, the more compacted and icy it becomes.

    Source: NSIDC researcher, Richard Armstrong, April 2002

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