It's Ice! It's Snow! It's Graupel!

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​IT'S ICE! IT'S SNOW! IT'S GRAUPEL!

       While winter snow and ice storms pummel the nation from the Pacific Northwest to the Mid-Atlantic and points South and Southwest, here in Columbus, Ohio we are currently dealing with a more unusual form of precipitation. It's not snow. It's not ice or sleet. It's not rain. Thankfully, it's not oobleck.

        What we are covered in is a blanket of graupel. That's right, graupel. See?

      Looks like snow, you say? It's not snow. That is to say, not exactly snow. Or ice. Or sleet. Or oobleck.
     Graupel is formed when water freezes on falling snow. Where does the water that freezes on the snow come from? I guess it's just there. Why does it attach to the snow flakes instead of just falling on its own? I don't know that, either. I guess it just does. 
       Anyway, the water that happens to be hanging around in the air hitches a free ride on the snowflake, and pretty soon the snowflake no longer looks like this:

...but like this:

      And so when it lands on the ground it looks like this: 

....which is to say, snow. But graupel is not snow, as anyone who tries tromping through it will soon learn.
     The thing about graupel is, it's soft and fluffy like snow, but it's slippery like ice, which becomes evident only when one steps onto it. Or into it. 
      And, unlike the soft, fluffy white stuff that it resembles, graupel weighs a ton, it's as heavy as ice, as one learns when one tries to shovel it.

      Now, this evening being the first time I'd ever encountered the stuff or even heard of it, I pondered, as my mate and I endeavored to shovel the slippery, heavy stuff from our walkway and driveway,     

...who thought to call it "graupel,"  which seemed to me an inappropriate word  for the substance it denoted. As I shoveled away I kept thinking of "graboid," which is the name of the monster in "Tremors," one of my favorite movies. A graboid having a mouthful of claws and snakes all the better for grabbing people,

...these people in particular,

...the name does seem to fit, onomatopoeiacally speaking, the thing.
     On the other hand "graupel," which also sounds like it should be a grabby thing or substance, is the complete polar opposite of anything grabby. In fact, graupel is slick as all get out, and would likely have taken both my mate and me down had we not been wearing our crampons attached to the bottoms of our boots, the word "crampon" likewise sounding to me like it should denote something other than  chains or spikes that attach to the bottom of one's boot.

But then I don't make up the words, do I?

Reference:​
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graupel