How long for rain to melt snow and ice?

[jaketodd]

I am here in the northwest, where we are going to have a huge snow storm, and I'm wondering:

How long would it take rain, falling at 0.3 inches per hour, to melt 6 inches of snow, and 1 inch of ice underneath said snow?

Thanks,

Jake

 

[DaveC426913]

There are a million factors that make this impossible to figure.

Temperature, sunlight, area, substrate, wind...

 

[turbo]

Add in the temperature of the roads and surfaces that the rain might fall on. Once our paved driveway falls reliably below freezing, we have no reasonable expectation that a warmer rain can possibly melt off the snow and ice. If anything, the snow will generally condense and densify, and the underlying ice will be all-but-impossible to dislodge.