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Relation of Artificial Cloud-Modification to the Production of Precipitation

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Compendium of Meteorology

Abstract

With the important discovery in 1946 that supercooled cloud elements could be artificially converted to ice crystals by introducing pellets of carbon dioxide snow [11, 12], the possibility of human control of weather seemed imminent. Claims and speculation concerning the degree of possible weather control and the probable amount of artificially induced precipitation were rife, and meteorological opinion ranged from the one extreme “of academic value only” to the other “of great economic and military importance.” The more favorable claims were supported in part by a few incompletely documented single experiments conducted in 1946 and 1947. These claims excited the interest of the public and stimulated demands for immediate weather control, drought relief, and storm diversion and dissipation, even though at the time there was no definite objective evidence that these were possible.

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Thomas F. Malone

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© 1951 American Meteorological Society

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Coons, R.D., Gunn, R. (1951). Relation of Artificial Cloud-Modification to the Production of Precipitation. In: Malone, T.F. (eds) Compendium of Meteorology. American Meteorological Society, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-940033-70-9_20

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-940033-70-9_20

  • Publisher Name: American Meteorological Society, Boston, MA

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-940033-70-9

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