Here’s a fun weather fact for you! If just 1 inch of rain fell over an area of
5,000 acres, the amount of water would be enough to fill almost 3-and-a-half million
40-gallon bathtubs! Imagine all the bubble baths! But wait -- the geek in me is now asking:
what would happen if all this rainwater gathered in one gigantic raindrop and fell to the earth? Well grab your floatation device, because
here we go! So, it's a stifling day in the middle of July,
and you're staying outside, trying to catch a breath of fresh air. Suddenly, you spot a dark, ominous-looking
cloud growing on the horizon. "Finally," you think. "I wouldn’t mind a cool shower!" But then, as the cloud is coming closer, you
notice that it has a bizarre shape and doesn’t look like a regular cloud. For one, it's too big for your liking. And secondly, it's narrower at the bottom
and spreads wider at the top. Suddenly, the whole sky turns so dark, it
looks like twilight. A wind picks up. At first, it's just gently ruffling your hair. But soon, you have to cover your eyes to protect
them from dust, sand, and other debris. The wind is gaining force, and now you have
trouble standing straight. You don't know it yet, but somewhere up there,
in the clouds, an imminent danger hides, ready to strike. All the rainstorm water has already gathered
into one monstrous drop weighing hundreds of millions of tons. This drop, which is almost a mile across,
appears several miles above the ground where rain usually condenses. For the next few minutes, you notice nothing
strange: just that dark and threatening cloud drawing closer. But just as you finally decide to hide inside
the nearest building, the drop starts falling. In shocked silence, you see the bottom of
the cloud bulging downward. It's widening... and widening... and in a
few seconds, the bottom side of the gigantic raindrop dips out of the cloud. You're terrified. Not only have you never seen anything like
that, but you also realize you don't have time to find shelter. The raindrop is rushing toward the ground
at 200 miles per hour. Its outer layer gets whipped up into spray
and turns into foam after mixing with the air. If the ground wasn't relatively close, the
wind would eventually disperse even such a huge drop into millions of raindrops. Unfortunately, there’s no time for that. In just 10 seconds after the drop comes into
view, its bottom edge hits the ground. At the moment of impact, the water is already
moving at 450 miles per hour. Mere seconds before the monstrosity touches
the ground, the grass right under the middle of the drop catches fire. This happens because the air can't rush from
under the falling drop fast enough, and the compression heats it, not only incredibly
fast, but also to an extreme temperature. But the fire doesn't last long because almost
immediately, tons of cold water extinguishes it. And what would happen to you if you stood
right under the center of the falling drop? Well, assuming that the drop was symmetrical,
the water would just fall around your body and wouldn't sweep you away. You’d probably have to raise your hands
above your head to streamline your body and take a deep breath since, after that, you'd
have to hold your breath for a long time. But to confess, it would be nothing but a
miracle if you survived being hit by a huge mass of water moving at more than half the
speed of sound. But if somehow you did, you’d feel pressure
similar to that at a depth of 1 mile (remember about the diameter of our raindrop?). Such pressure equals 155 atmospheres, and
it's 155 times more than what you feel on land at sea level. And since experiments have shown that the
maximum pressure a person can withstand is 71 atmospheres, you can probably imagine the
results of getting in the way of our massive drop of water. Yeah, your new nickname would be “Pancake”. But what if you stood a bit to the side, instead
of directly under the center of the raindrop? Still, nothing good would come out of it. A super-fast current of water would hit you
and sweep you away in the blink of an eye. It would be impossible to get out, with water
surrounding you from all sides. But the worst would be the acceleration that
would make all your struggle pointless. The good news is that now, you CAN buy that
farm! But wait! What if, for some inexplicable, mysterious
reason, you’d be floating inside the enormous raindrop? Then you’d feel nothing until the very last
moment. Complete darkness would surround you. If you decided to swim toward the edge of
the drop, you’d start to distinguish some dim daylight. But that's only if your lungs had enough capacity,
and you had enough time to get close to the side. You’d realize that you’re approaching
the ground when your ears start to pop. It’d be your body's reaction to the increase
in pressure caused by air resistance. Unfortunately, you wouldn't feel much after
that: the shock from the impact would create immense pressure, comparable to that at the
bottom of the Mariana Trench. No chances of survival, I'm afraid. So go ahead, kick that bucket. But let's return to our initial scenario where
you're standing far away from the raindrop and watching a real-time horror movie playing
in front of your eyes. The soil simply explodes in the places where
the water hits it. But the bedrock underneath is unyielding. It forces the water to rush sideways, destroying
everything in its path. If you're far enough, you still have some
time left to see the water expand outward, covering mile by mile of land; sweeping away
houses, bridges, and roads, and ripping up trees. As the raindrop water moves, it also pulls
along topsoil. In a matter of minutes, all that’s left
for miles around is bedrock covered with pools of mud. But the rainwater tsunami just wouldn't stop! It keeps moving outward, wiping away everything
within a distance of 20 miles from the face of the Earth. Boy I can just see a movie script here: We’ll
call it: The DoomsDay Drop! Catchy huh? If the drop has fallen in a place surrounded
by mountains, their ridges prevent the water from spreading further. Instead, massive streams surge to rivers and
lakes and fill the valleys. Hours later, areas hundreds of miles away
are suddenly hit by flash flooding. The inhabitants of these regions are bewildered
- they know nothing about the giant raindrop, and to them, the flood seems to be an inexplicable
weather phenomenon. And indeed, science wouldn't be able to explain
this event, should it ever occur. Luckily, you don't have to worry about something
that's never going to happen. On the other hand, regular rain also turns
out to be very exciting! - For example, the largest raindrops ever
recorded fell from the sky in Brazil in 1995 and on the Marshall Islands in 1999. They measured roughly a third of an inch across! - Not all rain that departs from the sky reaches
the ground! There’s so-called "phantom rain," when raindrops
falling from a cloud evaporate when they're nearing the Earth's surface. It forms a "Virga Cloud," which looks like
a tail extending from the real cloud. - It's a common misconception that a raindrop
looks like a teardrop, narrower at the top and wider at the bottom. In fact, when a raindrop appears up there,
in the atmosphere, it has a spherical shape. Only when it begins to fall, air resistance
flattens and curves the bottom of the raindrop. - Usually, rain starts as snow. Clouds consist of teeny crystals of ice and
freezing cold water. This water sticks to ice crystals and falls
to the ground in the form of ice balls. But as they draw closer to the Earth's surface,
which is warmer (if we don't talk about winters in North Dakota, of course), ice-drops melt
and turn into rain. - Large drops of rain fall faster than their
smaller mates. The average speed of a raindrop is 14 miles
per hour. Maybe this speed isn't as fast as you might
have thought, but it's for the better. If rain fell to the ground at a higher speed,
it could hit you hard enough to cause some serious inconvenience. Anyway, large raindrops can accelerate up
to 20 miles per hour. That's why it usually takes such a drop around
2 minutes to reach the ground if it's falling from 2,500 ft, which is where most rainclouds
hang out. But if a raindrop is smaller, it may need
up to 7 minutes to fall to the ground. If you should ever skydive through a rain
cloud, you’ll find it hurts as you zip through the rain, hitting all the tiny pointy ends
of the raindrops from behind. I can tell you from experience. Finally, here’s a bonus: Such precipitation
is heavily featured in a song from the classic movie western “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance
Kid”. If you know the title of this song, let me
know down in the comments. [add graphic: “Raindrops Are Falling On
My Head”] Hey that’s cheating! Alright then, who SANG it? Ha ha ha. Alright, if you learned something new today,
then give the video a like and share it with a friend! And here are some other videos I think you'll
enjoy. Just click to the left or right, and stay
on the Bright Side of life!
