chain aggregates

A type of snowflake in which multiple individual ice crystals or frozen droplets are joined end-to-end to form an elongated, quasi-linear structure.

In high-resolution cloud particle imagery, these particles often appear as three or more aligned ice crystals connected by narrow joints.

Nairy, C. M., D. J. Delene, J. A. Finlon, J. E. Yorks, E. Järvinen, and M. Schnaiter, 2026: In situ observations of ice crystal chain aggregates in winter storms. Geophys. Res. Lett., 53, e2025GL118365, https://doi.org/10.1029/2025GL118365.

Term edited 12 May 2026.