The Hudson Valley Is Cold Enough to Make Snow With Boiling Water

Just how cold is it outside? We decided to find out if it was possible to make snow just by throwing boiling water outside.

You may have seen others try this science experiment online. The idea is to take boiling water and throw it into the air. As the boiling water meets the freezing air, the steam is supposed to immediately turn into ice crystals, creating snow.

The trick will have varying degrees of success depending on how hot the boiling water is and how cold the air temperature actually gets. This weekend, temperatures in the Hudson Valley were right around zero, so we figured we'd give it a shot.

To our amazement, it looks like it actually worked. While a lot of the water just landed on the ground, you can see that some of the smaller water droplets actually turned into snow.

According to About Chemistry the optimal temperature for this experiment to work is at least -30 degrees. As the temperature rises it takes longer for the water to freeze, so most of the water remains liquid before it hits the ground. Although our temperature was just around zero, it's clear that some of the water did actually turn to snow. Plus, we didn't burn ourselves with the boiling water so I'm going to call this one a success.

Have you tried this experiment before? How did it work for you?