China overdoes cloud seeding to end drought... and blankets Beijing in snow
By MAIL FOREIGN SERVICE
Last updated at 5:01 PM on 01st November 2009
Chinese meteorologists went a bit over the top when they decided to 'seed' clouds in an effort to combat a lingering drought around Beijing.
They were successful in producing rain - but a sudden drop in temperatures meant the precipitation fell as snow, leaving the streets of the capital carpeted in the stuff on Sunday.
The unusually early snow blanketed the capital from Sunday morning and kept falling for half the day.
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It was helped by temperatures as low as -2C (29 Fahrenheit) and strong winds from the north, Xinhua news agency reported.
'We won't miss any opportunity of artificial precipitation since Beijing is suffering from the lingering drought,' the report quoted Zhang Qiang, head of the Beijing Weather Modification Office, as saying at the end of last week.
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Playtime: Children make the most of the snow
Chinese meteorologists have for years been honing the technique of making rain by injecting special chemicals into clouds.
Although the technique often gets results, a drought in the north of the country has continued for over a decade.
Besides the snow, which the Beijing Evening News said was the earliest to hit the capital in 10 years, the cold weather and strong winds also delayed air travel from Beijing's Capital Airport.
Source: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worl...jing-snow.html
Tue Nov 03, 2009 11:37 am