In The People’s Republic of China, it’s no secret that the Party controls just about everything. But as Beijing suffers through its second major snowstorm this season, residents are growing weary of their leadership’s control-freak tendencies. After all, while the storm came as a surprise to residents, the government knew about it all along. In fact, the government caused it.
China has long tinkered with Mother Nature’s waterworks, even establishing a state organ — the Beijing Weather Modification Office — whose sole purpose is to meddle with the weather. The purpose behind weather modification is less megalomaniacal than it sounds at first pass; a large swath of northeast China, including Beijing, has been mired in a drought for nearly a decade, and the party leadership would like to reverse that trend for both practical reasons and to show the Chinese people exactly who is in charge.
To do so, they’ve turned to cloud seeding, a controversial practice that involves launching (or dropping) chemicals into the atmosphere — silver iodide in China, though dry ice and liquid propane also work — that cause water vapor in the air to crystallize at temperatures it otherwise would not. Its effectiveness is dubious; while it’s generally accepted that it works to some degree, it can only increase precipitation by 20 percent. Sometimes.
Full story at Popsci
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tut tut look at the time!
Weird innit
Interesting but sad.
So many things the government do, it seems they are more maniac scientists than a government.
Just to quickly generalise why governments are wrong, is simple, they make laws – rather than solving the problem, getting to the root of why it’s happening, they make a law, and supress it.
It gets bad..
Hm .. here no weather control for sure … And that it is minimal they can do is quite clear .. I say stop with that for such dumb self gloating reasons (no rain on my parade??) ..
Damn Governments *shakes fist*
“And at 8:47… a cloud will appear, and it will rain for 38 minutes.” Now here’s Jonny with the sport.
I remember cloud seeding from waaaaay back. Wasn’t classed as ‘controversial’ then…but of course it was western scientists using it.
Interesting to see that China is taking over Russia’s ‘big-bad-superpower’ status. We positively need something to distract us from the fact we started a pointless war in the name of retaliation.
Wouldn’t say I agree with the Chinese leadership, but it’s a bit of a lame stretch by the author to connect the issue considering its history and the genuine reasoning behind it.
Now if they were directing hurricanes at the US or something…
Surely if that was possible… they should start shooting chemicals over the third world to help some crops and famine or somethin!
They’re the ones that cause the famine in the first place by taking their resources, why would they give them back in more moneys worth on controlling their weather?
jeez, i’d hate to think what would happen if they turned pagan & tried to use weather spells! :0
“Interesting to see that China is taking over Russia’s ‘big-bad-superpower’ status. ”
Um, wrong. That spot’s been taken by the US a long tme ago.
If they were really doing that, they would announce it ahead of time, as it would be better for propaganda purposes (as well as for helping the people prepare for the storms). They’ve already committed themselves to the project, so the best they can do now is wait until after the fact and then calmly announce “Oh yeah, we knew about that all along.”
WW3 is going to be fuuuuunnn.
beep beep get up now we are controling you get your coat on its going to rain rain rain……..
Wow it’s only going to be a matter of time before human kind successfully kills planet earth…there are things we should not mess with and mother nature is one of them, we have caused these problems and now we are trying to fix them with illogical and often stupid methods.
During Indonesia’s terrible bushfires, the chinese and russians offered to release rain onto it.
Why are people talking about global warming? As if humans have any control over the periodic changeable patterns of earth’s temperatures. The earth was hotter in the 1400′s and yet that was a very fertile time period. See “The Global Warming Swindle” documentary. Interviews some of the very top climate scientists who haven’t sold out for more grants, to show there is common accord that the evidence proves global warming is not man made and is a very natural occurance based on solar heat. See “End Game” to find out why this insane lie is being orchestrated. Wake up Neo.
@ Jay – I think human kind are mere pigmies in the face of mother nature – she will win and wipe us ‘pests’ from the face of the earth and start over.
@ Peter D – stop telling the truth, it is forbidden
english propaganda. this has no fact or relevance. how exactly is it ‘out of control’??
‘english propaganda’.. ??….er.. you mean .. you are alleging that it is propaganda typed in english….??..
…. lots of people are playing with the weather for various reasons….. for sure we can state this simple fact…
scientists are clever.. but they are VERY stupid.. selfish and egotistical… if they are lead by immbersiles.. politicians who are also egotistical and short sighted…. than yes.. all is or will be out of control…… The earth is a circuit and everything is connected… problem is.. we never built/created the earth….. if you cant completely reverse engineer it.. then how can you attempt to influence/engineer it.. confidently and without mishap… ??…..
… the knock on effects havent even started…. 37 degrees C. in Melbourne at Midnight… uk flooding and snow….
… bees disappearing… HELLO