(encore) Snowflakes. These intricate, whimsical crystals are a staple of magical wintry scenes, but how big can they really get? Well, according to the Guinness World Record keepers, the "largest snowflake" ever recorded was a whopping 15 inches in diameter. It was spotted near Missoula, Montana in 1887. But Kenneth Libbrecht, a physicist at Caltech, has long been skeptical of that record. So he set out to find what makes a snowflake a snowflake and whether that 1887 record is scientifically possible. You can read more about what he discovered here.Want to share the snowflakes you've spotted this winter? Email us a photo at [email protected] more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy
Chapter 1: What records does Guinness have about snowflakes?
You're listening to Shortwave from NPR. Hey, Shortwavers. Winter is here, at least for those of us who live in the northern hemisphere of our dear planet. And depending on where you are, there may or may not be snow. The Guinness World Record folks have compiled a bunch of records related to snow. And NPR's Nell Greenfield-Boyce was recently looking at them. Hey, Nell. Hey.
Okay, hit me with some snow records.
All right. How about the longest time spent in full body contact with snow? So that would be 105 minutes and two seconds.
Oh, my gosh. Those last two seconds must have been like intense. OK, let's hear another one.
How about the most people making snow angels simultaneously? So that one is 8,962 people who gathered in North Dakota. And then there's the largest snowflake. So the Guinness people say there was a snowflake 15 inches in diameter and 8 inches thick. that fell in Montana in 1887.
Wow, okay, so a snowflake that was more than a foot across? Is that, like, even possible? Okay, that's what I wanted to know.
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Chapter 2: Is a 15-inch snowflake scientifically possible?
I mean, come on, that is a big snowflake. And what I learned is that, you know, first of all, you have to make it clear what you mean by the word snowflake. And I recently talked to a couple of scientists about that. One of them is Kenneth Librecht. He's a physicist at Caltech. And that particular Guinness World Record has always kind of bugged him.
Chapter 3: Who is Kenneth Libbrecht and what is his view on snowflakes?
So he told me that just this past year, like six months ago, he decided to do something about it.
Oh, I'm intrigued. OK, today on the show, we look at snowflakes. how big they can really get, and what to think about this 19th century snowflake that was supposedly as big as a dinner plate. I'm Regina Barber. You're listening to Shorewave, the science podcast from NPR. Okay, now, you said you called up a physicist who knows something about snowflakes. What was his name again? Kenneth Librecht.
He really made a name for himself making snowflakes in the lab. Or as he would point out, he actually makes snow crystals.
There's a little problem with the language in that a snowflake means more than one thing.
I mean, when I say snowflake, do you imagine something that looks sort of like those snowflakes that people cut out of like white folded pieces of paper with scissors? Yes, absolutely, that six-fold symmetry. So that kind of snowflake is really a single ice crystal.
But a flake can also mean these big puffballs that fall from the sky that are actually many, many tiny snow crystals that have gotten sort of tangled up together. And that's why the Guinness World Record for the largest snowflake really bothered Kenneth Librecht. He says it's got to refer to that kind of puffball, but... When people hear the world's biggest snowflake,
they always imagine a snow crystal, which is a different beast entirely.
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Chapter 4: What does a real snowflake look like?
He says, like, there's no way you would get a natural snow crystal 15 inches across. Okay, so how big could that crystal get? Well, as I said, you know, he really got famous as someone who could make snow crystals in the lab. And he told me the biggest one he ever made was about an inch across. And he said that one looked pretty crappy. It was kind of falling apart under its own weight.
But he also goes out and photographs natural snow crystals, like the ones that fall, you know, during a snowstorm. He used to make special trips up to Ontario to this place where the average temperature was about five degrees Fahrenheit, which is really optimal for beautiful snow crystals to form. And that's where he was 20 years ago on December 30th, watching the snow fall.
Just all of a sudden, these really large flowers appear. just came falling out of the sky. And I mean, they were very noticeable because they were just gigantic.
They were about five times bigger than the average snow crystal. But even so, they weren't that big. I mean, he got a photo of one that was 10 millimeters across. So 10 millimeters, that's a centimeter. Or for those of you stuck with inches, it's like four tenths of an inch, a little under half an inch.
Chapter 5: How big can snow crystals actually get?
And what he called these flowers were these like single crystals, right? I mean, you're right. That's not that big, really.
He says that pretty much all the people who seriously photograph snow crystals, and, like, there aren't that many of them who are willing to go out with microscopes and cameras and, you know, be out there at night in the cold, you know, watching snowflakes fall. He knows them, and no one has come forward to show him anything bigger than that one. Okay.
So about six months ago, he finally, you know, just got sick of this world record for the biggest snowflake that the Guinness World Record people have. And so he contacted them, and he told them, look— Your big snowflake record from the 19th century is potentially confusing. So why don't you make a new record for the largest individual snow crystal? And here one is. Here it is.
I took a photo of it.
And I told them that, you know, even if mine was not the biggest, it'd be fun. People might now be inclined to look around and find a bigger one.
Plus, in their records, they could sort of cross-reference this new world record for the largest snow crystal with their existing record for the largest snowflake, which would, you know, educate people about what these records actually meant. So that's what they did. They went for it. And the new listing points out that a snowflake is made of many, many individual crystals.
And it lists that one he took a picture of as the biggest one.
OK, so does that record for the world's biggest snowflake still stand?
Yes, it's still there, but added to it is this extra little qualifier about the largest individual snow crystal.
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Chapter 6: What changes did Kenneth propose for snowflake records?
But she wouldn't flat out say, like, it could never happen. It's impossible.
This is one of the issues in science, is that you can always get outliers.
Still, okay. Think about this. She's been taking photographs of falling snowflakes for years and she has never seen one that big. She has this special contraption with motion sensors and cameras and like the snow kind of falls through it.
One of the interesting things about snow to me is it's falling just fast enough that we can't as humans see it very well. We sort of get the impression that And so, you know, we're using this technology to kind of like take a snapshot and get a good picture of it.
And each picture is really cool because it shows just like dozens or even hundreds of tiny, tiny snow crystals that are all loosely entangled. So, you know, each individual crystal has its own shape, like you might have needles, like these sort of sharp looking things or little fuzzy balls. And they're all sort of
very loosely connected into this three-dimensional complex shape that has this delicate structure. And it's usually, you know, got a lot of like little holes in it and it's elongated and it's kind of flattened, you know. So it's not like a round ball or something. It's really quite weird looking. I mean, I wouldn't think just looking at snowfall that that is what a snowflake looks like.
But when you see it, you know, sort of like just white against black, kind of frozen in time. It's really pretty cool.
Okay, I want to see these images now, right? But okay, let's just cut to the chase here. Realistically, what size would she ever expect to see for real, like out in the wild?
So she and her colleagues have taken photos of more than 100,000 snowflakes, and the biggest she's ever seen was 35.33 millimeters. Wow. across. So that's like 1.4 inches, like almost an inch and a half.
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