Sleet

Ice pellets

Ice pellets or sleet is a form of precipitation consisting of small, hard, translucent balls of ice. Ice pellets are different from graupel, which is made of frosty white opaque rime; and from a mixture of rain and snow, which is a slushy liquid or semisolid. Ice pellets often bounce when they hit the ground or other solid objects, and make a higher-pitched "tap" when striking objects like jackets, windshields, and dried leaves, compared to the dull splat of liquid raindrops. Pellets generally do not freeze into other solid masses unless mixed with freezing rain. The METAR code for ice pellets is PL.

Rain and snow mixed

Rain and snow mixed or sleet is precipitation composed of a mixture of rain and partially melted snow. Unlike ice pellets, which are hard, and freezing rain, which is fluid until striking an object where it fully freezes, this precipitation is soft and translucent, but it contains some traces of ice crystals from partially fused snowflakes, also called slush. In any one location, it usually occurs briefly as a transition phase from rain to snow or vice-versa, but hits the surface before fully transforming. Its METAR code is RASN or SNRA.

sleet

Noun

1. Pellets of ice made of mostly-frozen raindrops or refrozen melted snowflakes.
2. Precipitation in the form of a mixture of rain and snow.

Verb

1. To be in a state in which sleet is falling.