China Vows to Stop the Rain

Since the Olympic stadium doesn't have a roof, the Beijing Meteorological Bureau has been given the task of making sure the games remain dry. According to Zhang Qian, head of weather manipulation (best title to have on a business card ever) at the bureau, they've had success with light rain but heavy rain remains tough to control. I see a hurricane cannon in some lucky country's future.

I can just imagine

[WormholeFiend]

what the post-opening propaganda will be like if that day turns out to have sunny blue skies...

Operation weather disaster

[elyk]

Any of you ever played that game? This reminds me of a quote by the evil genius: "Everyone talks about the weather, but nobody ever does anything about the weather. Well, I'm going to do something about it".

Cloud seeding and cloud freezing?

[KublaiKhan]

Not exactly 'new' tech...the silver iodide version's been around forever, and the liquid nitrogen version doesn't sound particularly revolutionary.

It does, however, go along with the Chinese cultural desire to control the elements, which heretofore has been embodied mostly with the rivers--the legendary "Yellow Emperor" was the first to stop the flooding of the Yang Tze; the current government has thrown massive resources into the Three Gorges dam. Controlling the rivers has been traditionally (as far as I recall, anyway) seen as evidence of controlling the land, and thus of being a legitimate government.

Controlling the rain, then, would be an extension of this.

Re:Rain's better than smog

[randyest]

That sure seems more reasonable. But what would make the most sense, to me, would be to have used some of that cheap labor to build some indoor stadiums and HEPA air filters. I mean, who wants to sit for hours outside breathing air that, on most days, is considered "very dangerous to breathe," raining or not?

Paul McCartney has a story about this

[Vampyre_Dark]

He says that during his Live in Red Square concert, it looked like there was going to be a storm, and officials sent a bunch of fighter jets scrambling over them causing the clouds to disappear, and soon after, it was a warm, sunny day. The story was much more detailed than that. It involved some official giving him assurance that the weather would be good on the day of the concert and other bits. A lot more interesting than I am able to recall right now.

I wish I could remember when he said that, I could post a link to something.

Re:Rain's better than smog

[jellie]

In a strange (?) coincidence, China is experiencing blizzards that have severely hindered their railway system [nytimes.com] due to the difficulties of shipping coal. It might not be that bad come summer time, but who knows. It might help them realize that their dependence on coal is infeasible. And maybe the US should take heed.

Re:Cloud seeding and cloud freezing?

[KublaiKhan]

Controlling the water means you control the people, as well--remember, China has been, traditionally, a largely agricultural country, dependent upon a certain flood cycle.

If you control the rivers, you control the land they feed and drain. If you control the feeding and draining, you control the people who need that feeding and draining to survive, and to grow food. If you control the people who grow food, you control the people who need food--and that's more or less everyone.

It all comes back to the water.

Perhaps heat.

[foxtrot]

Believe it or not, the United States already has this technology. And it's in the hands of the rednecks.

There's a stock car track in Bristol, TN that holds 165,000 people, and has 43 800+ horsepower cars running around an oval just a shade over a half mile long. This generates a lot of heat-- body heat, engine heat, heat from tires cornering on concrete fast enough to turn fifteen second laps. Enough heat that, as long as the race is still running, rain clouds can blow over Bristol, drench the entire city with rain, but the pocket of high pressure due to the heat (and possibly some counter-clockwise swirling motion due to the cars) will keep the rain from passing directly over the track.

If the caution flag flies and the cars slow down for too long, thus slowing the heat output and cooling the track, the rain may start to fall on the track, but it takes one heck of a storm to make the rain fall while the race is green-flagged.

-F