snow blindness
noun
: inflammation and photophobia caused by exposure of the eyes to ultraviolet rays reflected from snow or ice
Examples of snow blindness in a Sentence
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For anyone who’s been lucky enough not to experience it, snow blindness—technically called ultraviolet (UV) keratitis—happens when your corneas are exposed to too much ultraviolet light, which reflects off snow.
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Kristin Canning, SELF, 6 Feb. 2025
It’s also known as snow blindness or welder’s flash when it’s caused by sunlight reflecting off snow in arctic conditions or the light from a welder’s torch.
—Daniel Wu, Washington Post, 9 Apr. 2024
In airy PS 64 Frederick Law Olmsted, in affluent, white north Buffalo, 22 would-be Arctic explorers wrestled with how to build a shelter if their team leader had frostbite and snow blindness.
—NBC News, 14 Oct. 2020
Another challenge for those who lived in Arctic regions was snow blindness.
—Emma Yasinski, Discover Magazine, 16 Mar. 2021
Protecting your eyes from snow blindness is no joke.
—Mike Richard, Men's Health, 16 Sep. 2022
This is part of the snow blindness created by oppression in this country by a dominant group.
—Maureen Lee Lenker, EW.com, 23 Mar. 2022
Of all the horrors of a 19th-century European voyage to the Arctic—noses and cheeks turned necrotic by frostbite, snow blindness, sea madness, broken bones badly knit—perhaps most ghastly was scurvy.
—Bathsheba Demuth, The Atlantic, 22 Sep. 2021
The second climber, Pakistani-American Puwei Liu, 55, reached the Hillary Step at 28,800 feet before suffering exhaustion and snow blindness, a condition in which a person loses much of their vision in the bright snow.
—Alan Arnette, Outside Online, 13 May 2021
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Kristin Canning, SELF, 6 Feb. 2025
It’s also known as snow blindness or welder’s flash when it’s caused by sunlight reflecting off snow in arctic conditions or the light from a welder’s torch.
—Daniel Wu, Washington Post, 9 Apr. 2024
In airy PS 64 Frederick Law Olmsted, in affluent, white north Buffalo, 22 would-be Arctic explorers wrestled with how to build a shelter if their team leader had frostbite and snow blindness.
—NBC News, 14 Oct. 2020
Another challenge for those who lived in Arctic regions was snow blindness.
—Emma Yasinski, Discover Magazine, 16 Mar. 2021
Protecting your eyes from snow blindness is no joke.
—Mike Richard, Men's Health, 16 Sep. 2022
This is part of the snow blindness created by oppression in this country by a dominant group.
—Maureen Lee Lenker, EW.com, 23 Mar. 2022
Of all the horrors of a 19th-century European voyage to the Arctic—noses and cheeks turned necrotic by frostbite, snow blindness, sea madness, broken bones badly knit—perhaps most ghastly was scurvy.
—Bathsheba Demuth, The Atlantic, 22 Sep. 2021
The second climber, Pakistani-American Puwei Liu, 55, reached the Hillary Step at 28,800 feet before suffering exhaustion and snow blindness, a condition in which a person loses much of their vision in the bright snow.
—Alan Arnette, Outside Online, 13 May 2021
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Cite this Entry
“Snow blindness.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/snow%20blindness. Accessed 23 Feb. 2025.
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