The Guinness World Record for exceptionally large snowflakes was set in 1887, near Missoula in Montana, USA. The flakes were 1 ft 3 in (38 cm) wide and 8 in (20 cm) thick. I pictured huge intricate shapes falling from the sky but snow researcher, Kenneth Libbrecht, explains that snow flakes are actually clumps of snow crystals. Individual snow crystals display the lacey six-fold symmetry like the photo above or the shapes we cut out of paper when we were kids. The largest individual snow crystal was much smaller at 10 mm (0.39 in) from tip to tip.
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