Some call it falls trails, others call it precipitation trails, and the Germans call it falls, but most meteorologists call it Virga.

Virga is a streak or sink of precipitation that you see falling from a cloud, but which evaporates or sublimes before reaching the surface. This usually happens when the layer of air closest to the Earth’s surface is very dry. This causes rain or snow falling from a cloud to essentially dissolve into the air mass and turn into water vapor. Sometimes Virga is the culprit of false radar returns. Have you ever checked our weather app and seen green above your location, but it just wasn’t raining? Chances are the radar was seeing the rain falling several thousand feet in the sky, but it was being sucked up by the dry air right above your head. Virga is most commonly seen in the western United States and in drier climates such as deserts. Even if you can’t “feel the rain on your skin,” cries Natasha Bedingfield, virga can still impact weather conditions on Earth’s surface.

As precipitation falls from a liquid or solid to water vapor, this process removes heat from the air and causes temperatures to drop. In some cases, these pockets of cooler air can descend quickly and create a dry microburst or rainless microburst.

Now this may lead you to wonder: what exactly is a microburst? For that, you’ll have to tune in next week for our next Weather Word of the Week.

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