Quote:
Originally Posted by ishoot308
That was pretty cool no pun intended! What I don’t get is I have been freezing plastic water bottles for years to use in my cooler and I have never had one not freeze as is shown in the video….why is that? 
Dan |
I believe that the water needs to be relatively free of impurities, and very still during the supercooling process. There is mostly likely also a window of opportunity where the water is below freezing point, but not solid. At some point (0F?, -10F?) I think it freezes no matter what in that scenario.
In regards to the original question of this thread, I think it is very common for fresh water lakes to have water that is colder than 32F and still not solid. I also think it can be difficult to predict what exactly will make those waterways start to freeze over.
I posted the water bottle example because there is a part of the equation that involves any part of the water freezing, such as along a shoreline, and giving new ice crystals something to "hang on" to. This can be shoreline ice that creeps towards the center of the water body, or surface ice that forms in calmer conditions and then allows more ice to build under it.
Or the super short answer to what would cause The Broads to freeze over is "nobody can guess for sure"
