Re: What is the differnce between rain, snow, sleet, freezing rain and hail?

Rain is a water droplet that has precipitated out of the air at high
altitude, and falls to the earth.

Sleet is that same water droplet that freezes into an ice pellet before
it hits the ground.

Freezing rain is just that -- the rain falls as a liquid, and then freezes
on surfaces after it has landed.

Snow is water that has crystallized out of a very cold atmosphere.

Hail begins its life as a raindrop which freezes, and gets caught by 
high-level convection currents and carried up and down through a thunder-
storm cell, accumulating more and more layers of ice, until it grows
so heavy it falls.

All of the above serve useful ecological purposes...just don't tell that
to the person whose car just got hail-pocks all over it.