Aroyo's

It is very hard to predict cloudbursts, but it can be done. The world's first predicted cloudburst occured in India in 2010.

Cloudbursts are sudden rainstorms caused when nimbus clouds become saturated with water vapor in the atmosphere and release large quantity's of heavy rain. Flash flooding is often associated with these downpours.

Cloudburst is a form of precipitation along with the hailstones. Sometimes, the strong winds blowing upwards push the down pouring raindrops in the reverse direction, that is, towards the clouds. In this process, the raindrops change into hailstones and the clouds become heavier. These hailstones are so heavy that the upward winds cannot hold their weight. This results in a sudden heavy downpour along with the large hailstones. This is known as the cloudburst. Cloudburst is mostly seen in mountainous regions. In India, you can find such cloudbursts occur often in Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand. All heavy rains are not necessarily cloudbursts.

Cloudbursts descend from very high clouds, sometimes with tops above 15 kilometers. Meteorologists say the rain from a cloudburst is usually of the shower type with a fall rate equal to or greater than 100mm (3.94 inches) per hour.

During a cloudburst, more than 2 cm of rain may fall in a few minutes. When there are instances of cloudbursts, the results can be disastrous.

Rapid precipitation from cumulonimbus clouds is possible due to so called Langmuir precipitation process in which large droplets can grow rapidly by coagulating with smaller droplets which fall down slowly.