Let's use nukes to stop hurricanes...

[MrRant 0]

Amateurs search for hurricane cures

 

Sunday, September 12, 2004 Posted: 11:05 PM EDT (0305 GMT)

 

http://www.cnn.com/2004/WEATHER/09/12/hurricane.cure.ap/

 

JACKSONVILLE, Florida (AP) -- Amateur hurricane-busters have come up with any number of crackpot ideas to spare Florida from ferocious storms. Among them: blowing hurricanes away with giant fans or blowing them up with nuclear warheads.

 

Even the federal government got into the act, with three decades of ill-fated research called "Project Stormfury" before shelving the idea of weather modification in the 1980s.

 

But dozens of ideas -- part hope, part fantasy -- continue to crop up among weather wonks, Internet bloggers and others who think they have come up with a way to spare coastal residents the misery of hurricanes.

 

Suggestions have included coating the surface of the water with olive oil; towing an iceberg down to Florida to cool down the water temperature; or building large fans on the coast to blow away approaching storms.

 

"And then there was a guy who called and said he could pray them away," said Hugh Willoughby, a research professor with the International Hurricane Center at Florida International University.

 

By far the most outlandish proposal, and one of the most recurrent, was the idea to use a nuclear warhead to blow a hurricane out of the water.

 

"Hurricanes are bad enough without being radioactive," Willoughby said. "Put that genie back in the bottle. Nuclear weapons are more dangerous than hurricanes."

 

Willoughby, who reviewed some of the proposed inventions when he was director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's hurricane research division, said many of the ideas are quickly debunked for lacking a basic understanding of meteorology.

 

One government plan was to spread a substance on the water, but the wind and waves made it impossible to keep a slick, he said.

 

"All of these underestimate the scale of a storm," Willoughby said.

 

Still, one South Florida businessman thinks he has a winning idea -- flying a Boeing 747 into the monster storm, where it would hit it with tons of super absorbent powder, literally sucking it dry and breaking it apart.

 

Only a test will determine if it is a flight of fantasy, and there are no plans to try the process on the approaching Hurricane Ivan.

 

But businessman Peter Cordani, chief operating officer of Dyn-O-Mat, a company that sells environmental absorbent products, thinks he can knock down a storm by one or two categories.

 

He claims to have caused a thunderstorm to disappear in a test off Palm Beach, and he's assembled a team including two former astronauts to work on the plan.

 

"We have a lot of confidence in it," said Scott Mac Leod, one of the astronauts who tested the lunar module.

 

Others aren't so sure.

 

The government's Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory describes the proposal as a long-shot: Any effect of the absorbent powder would be small, and require thousands of tons of goop, flown into the storm in hundreds of sorties every half hour or so.

 

Willoughby said the project would be "hugely expensive for not much benefit."

 

"It would really take all of the military heavy-lift aircraft that the United States has to carry the material, and there would be a major air traffic control problem around the eye," he told the AP last year.

 

The government suggests that amateur hurricane busters focus their energy on more realistic goals -- enforcing building codes, educating the public about preparedness and helping poorer nations prepare for the storms.

[Jingus 0]

I thought of using nukes to break up hurricanes. In theory, it would work; it's the only power humans possess that's stronger than mother nature.

 

Of course, I thought of it when I was twelve, wrote a school paper on it, and ended it by saying the whole idea wouldn't work because of radioactivity and massive tidal waves produced by said nukes.

[Cuban Linx 0]

Got to nuke something.

[Dr. Tom 0]

I'd be willing to see if we can stop sandstorms with nukes...

[2GOLD 0]

I'd be willing to see if we can stop Bill Maher with nukes.

 

Yeah, using nukes on hurricanes would work! Well, cept for that massive loss of crops and life the radiation would cause...but no more hurricane!

[Downhome 0]

We should use a time machine to end hurricanes.

 

Either that or this.

 

[2GOLD 0]

We should use a time machine to end hurricanes.

 

Either that or this.

 

 

Is that Bea Arthur dancing with an alien?

[Downhome 0]

It's Bea Arthur dancing with Ponda Baba (Walrusman) in the Cantina in the Star Wars universe!

 

Happy Life Day you fucking hurricanes!

[MarvinisaLunatic 0]

All this would do is create a Super Hurricane 15 times more powerful than a regular hurricane..

 

Duh.

[Highland 0]

That would be awesome.

[Red Baron 0]

No matter how many nukes there is, Keith Richards will somehow stay alive.

[Masked Man of Mystery 0]

Just send Shane Helms.

[Red Baron 0]

and the SHIT Squad.

[GreatWhiteNope 0]

Still, one South Florida businessman thinks he has a winning idea -- flying a Boeing 747 into the monster storm, where it would hit it with tons of super absorbent powder, literally sucking it dry and breaking it apart.

How about flying above the storm clouds and dropping powder from there?

 

Since, you know, anyone flying a manned plane straight into a hurricane would be fucked.

[2GOLD 0]

Still, one South Florida businessman thinks he has a winning idea -- flying a Boeing 747 into the monster storm, where it would hit it with tons of super absorbent powder, literally sucking it dry and breaking it apart.

How about flying above the storm clouds and dropping powder from there?

 

Since, you know, anyone flying a manned plane straight into a hurricane would be fucked.

 

Dammit man!

It would just be one death to execute a really stupid and insane plan!

 

Why don't we just put Richard Simmons on the shoreline and let him be Richard Simmons?

[Guest Vitamin X]

These hurricanes are way overrated. The harm of using a nuke or that silly powder absorbent plan far outweighs the damage most of these hurricanes could cause. Maybe I'd think differently if I lived in Central Florida, but who the hell lives there? Tampa and Orlando not withstanding...