As the temperature drops and precipitation looms in the forecast, one form of wintry weather that may impact people is what is known as sleet.

Unlike hail or sleet, graupel is soft and can be crushed easily in your hand, and is sometimes called "soft hail." It is also usually smaller than hail, with a diameter of around 0.08-0.2 inches.

With winter storms moving through the area, the National Weather Service in Wilmington said it had received many questions about how sleet formed when it is so cold outside.

So, let’s talk about how sleet and hail form. Sleet is a type of precipitation that can occur during winter storms. Temperatures are very cold near the base of clouds during winter weather.

There are four basic types of precipitation we see in the winter rain, freezing rain, sleet, and snow.

With a wave of snow and freezing rain moving through the Tri-State Wednesday, we quickly started getting reports of frozen precipitation.

Whether it's fluffy snow, a slop of sleet, icy freezing rain or just plain rain, temperatures on the precipitation's journey from the cloud means everything.

Where hail is formed in a hostile environment, the opposite is true for sleet. Also, sleet are small balls of ice (frozen raindrops), rather than being large and destructive.

I first heard it hit the bedroom windows at 6:05 a.m. on Tuesday morning. It was unmistakable, yet I couldn't, or rather, refused to believe it. The metallic tapping of sleet hitting the windows ...

To ensure accurate precipitation measurements, the NWS has established guidelines for measuring and reporting snow and sleet totals and converting them into liquid equivalents.