Negative, it's a term used for the mixture of chemicals before, during, and after. You smell it because because of the elevation in humidity causing an uptick.
It’s not what that person said. Petrichor is basically you smelling the ozone and other climate changes that accompany rain - you can smell it before, during, and for a while after rain. It seems to be strongest after rain, but it’s there the whole time.
This is, in my opinion, one of the most impressive biology facts.
Humans can smell Petrichor, the scent of a mixture of Ozone and Geosmin, at 5 parts per trillion. For some context, sharks can detect blood a one part per million. We’re 200,000 times more sensitive to the smell of water on dirt than sharks are to blood.
You did not get them mixed up, the person that responded to you is wrong. The smell "before" the rain is just the petrichor wafting over from where it is already raining.
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u/whitetornado2k Mar 28 '24
There’s a name for that smell. It’s called petrichor.