❄️➡️💧 Why Ice Melts When heat is absorbed, ice transforms into water. In solid ice, water molecules are locked in a rigid crystalline lattice, held together by hydrogen bonds. These bonds aren’t strong like covalent bonds, but they’re just strong enough to keep molecules in place. As temperature rises, heat energy weakens and breaks those hydrogen bonds, freeing the molecules to move. The result? The orderly structure collapses into liquid water, where molecules are more mobile and intermolecul