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I know what you mean. WWG1WGA mentioned this in a video so I tried it. I compacted snow tightly and then used a lighter. Yeah, I fell for it too, a few years ago. It's actually a process called sublimation. The burning black is the gas that attaches to the snow from the lighter and burns. I'm from Phoenix so I did not grow up with snow, but I now live in snow country. My friend from Canada explained sublimation to me. Regular snow will melt, but when you compact it tightly, it's something to do with the lack of oxygen trapped inside.
What a trip. Sublimation. Interesting. I’m going to have to tell my kids. That doesn’t explain it not dripping whatsoever. It should be melting from me holding it in my hand. I did this again in the house in front of my husband and grandkids. It’s 71 degrees in here. In retrospect, if it is something man made, I shouldn’t have burned it in the house. I was shocked, obviously. I laid it out on the porch. It rained later and dissolved it .
Sublimation is simply when a solid turns directly to gas. This occurs, for example, if you notice ice on a sidewalk and it just disappears without having melted first. I'm not sure what u/stevethefish76 is referring to here, exactly.
Now, yes, a compacted chunk of snow won't melt as easily, and the lighter is probably just sooting it up, not enough heat to melt it? How cold was the snow?
Well, putting the two together, maybe pretty cold snow, not enough heat, it just stays solid and soots up, and any that does transform phase goes straight to gas? I guess I could see this....
Edit: One thought that did occur, is the fake snow could be those white chalky grill-lighting cubes* but I'd say that would be rather obvious when you attempted to melt them with a lighter.
*What a mess. If you use these damn things, switch to the ones that are like a big flat match. You can actually break them into like fourths and light that piece, that's plenty for charcoal chimney - it's a ripoff if you use the whole thing like a big match.
The snow wasn’t that cold. The weather later turned into rain. It’s still raining now. That’s interesting, to say the least. I don’t never remember snow doing that but then again I wasn’t compacting it and attempting to melt it with a Bic. Anytime I’ve held a snowball, it always started melting in my hand right away. This did not. I picked up this burnt snowball a while later and smelled it. It smelled like plastic. It dissolved with the rain later. I obviously need to research this more. I appreciate your input, and u/stevethefish76. Thank you both. I’ll check out YouTube.
Huh. Well if it didn't melt in your hand, ok that's something very obviously. Smelled like plastic - also something that would not be explained by all this water/fire/science stuff.
Veddy intheresting....
There are videos explaining sublimation on YT you can find, for sure. I'm sure if you just grab some snow and put it on your carpet inside and leave it there, it'll melt and make a wet spot. It's the process of compressing the snow and then trying to burn it is where sublimation is a factor.