How is Rain formed?
The sun shines on the sea water and heats it. The causes the water to evaporate and rise as water vapour. Once the water vapour reaches high in the sky, it condenses and forms clouds. These clouds are blown towards land by wind. The clouds precipitate over the land as rainfall. This cycle repeats itself. This is called a rain cycle.
Thus we see that the water cycle in nature is basically made up of four main parts, these are:
- Evaporation
- Condensation
- Precipitation
- Accumulation
Evaporation
Evaporation stage involves the heating up of water from various water bodies like the oceans, seas, lakes, rivers and changing into gaseous form – water vapour and rising to the atmosphere.
Condensation
Condensation is a process in which the gaseous state changes into the liquid state.
Precipitation
Precipitation actually denotes the action of falling.
Accumulation
In this stage there is a runoff from the hills and the mountains, the water thus accumulating back into the lakes, rivers seas and oceans. When the water ends up with no water body around, it soaks in to the ground making itself available as underground water, for the use of plants and animals.
For more interesting Geography articles and videos, visit our Geography for Kids category.