How rain reacts vs wind speed
Posted: Fri Jul 15, 2011 5:21 pm
Have there been any studies on how rain reacts (or rather, looks like), versus the wind speed that is occurring at the time?
For instance, you are in a thunderstorm, it is raining hard, and the wind really kicks up. What does the rain look like at 20 mph? 40 mph? 60 mph? At what speed does "streaking" start occurring? I'm curious because I went through a storm on Wednesday, and estimated the winds at about 45 mph. I measured (with a Kestrel) a max gust of 27.5 mph, but missed the strongest winds due to having to hold down a tent wall, so we didn't lose the tent (we were in the field). There was not much to estimate the winds off of, other than past experience. We did lose 2 tents (they collapsed), along with having a few antennas blown down. Also, our TACMET measured sustained winds of 19 knots (that was the highest I saw on it, but was preoccupied, so didn't look for long).
One thing I noticed is that, during the peak winds, the ground was mostly white from the rain streaking across the field we were in...even right outside the tent. That made me wonder if there had been a study done about how rain looks/acts at certain wind speeds, and if it could be an indicator in estimating wind speeds?
For instance, you are in a thunderstorm, it is raining hard, and the wind really kicks up. What does the rain look like at 20 mph? 40 mph? 60 mph? At what speed does "streaking" start occurring? I'm curious because I went through a storm on Wednesday, and estimated the winds at about 45 mph. I measured (with a Kestrel) a max gust of 27.5 mph, but missed the strongest winds due to having to hold down a tent wall, so we didn't lose the tent (we were in the field). There was not much to estimate the winds off of, other than past experience. We did lose 2 tents (they collapsed), along with having a few antennas blown down. Also, our TACMET measured sustained winds of 19 knots (that was the highest I saw on it, but was preoccupied, so didn't look for long).
One thing I noticed is that, during the peak winds, the ground was mostly white from the rain streaking across the field we were in...even right outside the tent. That made me wonder if there had been a study done about how rain looks/acts at certain wind speeds, and if it could be an indicator in estimating wind speeds?