Does “Rain” Smell?

Short answer is yes and here is why.

Living in the Hudson Valley we all get to experience some pretty cool changing of the seasons. I love this time of year in the Valley, when we come out of a cold, dark winter into a not so cold spring, and as spring takes over we start to get more rain than any other time of year. How does the saying go? April showers brings May flowers? Something like that....LOL!

Have you ever noticed that when it's getting ready to rain or just after a shower there is a certain scent that takes over the Hudson Valley? If you've noticed it you're not alone and there is an actual name for the scent.

According to News 10 and a couple of scientists, the scent of rain is called "petrichor" which was coined back in 1964. The name petrichor comes from combing two Greek words to make one. The first word is petros, which means "stone". The second word is ichor, which translates to "the fluid that flows in the veins of the gods", put them together and you get petrichor.

Petrichor is something that most of us notice around this time of year because scientists say we are extremely sensitive to this smell. Most of us smell the scent on a day when a light rain hits dry soil, the soil then releases the oil into the air with a bacteria called "geosmin". Scientists also say only a small amount of the "geosmin bacteria" in the air will trigger us to notice the smell.