Home / Editor's Pick /

Do you know what this is? The beauty & science behind rain shafts

05:34 PM
May 26, 2023

Do you know what this is?
The beauty & science behind rain shafts

These are weather eye candy! Precipitation or rain shafts. These look like there is a hole in the sky and all the rain is falling from it. Well, it is not quite a hole, but there is often lots of precipitation falling from it.

These walls of rain can be seen from a great distance. They are vertical columns of heavy rain that are confined to a relatively small area, many times they could easily cause some flooding.

They have well-defined vertical drafts, where there is rapidly ascending air, feeding the storm cell, and rapidly descending winds dropping all that rain and winds! Often, these shafts produce microbursts that cause damage.

Irene Sans
More on the topic
First frosts can begin in September as autumn temps move in.
Sunday, September 21, 2025

Meteorological autumn

The average first frosts in the U.S.
Fog impacting the Appalachian Mountains.
Sunday, October 12, 2025

Low clouds

10 facts about fog
EF-2 tornado pictured in Colorado
Saturday, October 18, 2025

World of Twisters

Tornado myths answered
All weather news
This might also interest you
Monday, October 20, 2025

Summer lingers

Autumn missing from Texas
Monday, October 20, 2025

Daily briefing

Snow, heavy rain for the northern tier
Friday, October 24, 2025

Texas and the Southeast

Multi-day flood threat
All articles
Weather & Radar

www.weatherandradar.com

instagramfacebookthreadsContact uslinkList
Privacy policy | Legal info | Accessibility statement