Is it just me, or is there more hail than usual?
If you live
in the Calgary, Airdrie, Red Deer, and the Sylvan lake area, it may seem that every
single afternoon there are thunderstorms and hail warnings. Although we live in
what scientist refer to as “hailstorm alley,” that is, an area that is a
hot spot for forming clouds that cause these pesky hailstones to smash down on
us, we are seeing a lot more hail than usual this summer.
We all know
hail can wreak havoc on homes and vehicles, but did you know that insurance companies
have spent over 2 billion dollars in Alberta hail insurance claims in the past five
years?! Hail can also cause serious damage to crops, which can greatly affect the
livelihood of farmers. So what are we doing about?
We can purposely change the weather. No really, we can do that:
Unbeknownst
to many people, weather modification is actually a thing that is researched and
implemented in many countries around the world. Mostly, weather modification is
done to help moderate storms such as hurricanes and hailstorms, but also to
help increase precipitation.
In 2008, China launched over 1,000 silver
iodide rockets into the sky to ensure all the clouds dropped their rain before
they reached the opening ceremony arena.
Alberta Hail fighters:
While we
keep our eyes to the sky, and our weather alerts on during potential hail days,
a team of scientists, meteorologist, and pilots work 24-7 in Didsbury Alberta to
help minimize the damage of hail to our homes and vehicles. Completely funded by private insurance
companies, this team of 15 operate tirelessly form June to September monitoring
weather patterns for hail risk. Without this team, we would definitely see
larger hailstones and more hailstones showering down at us, causing millions
upon millions of damage. So how do they do it? How do they change the weather
to minimize the amount of hail we get? They use technique called cloud seeding.
We fertilize clouds?
Not
exactly, but in Alberta we use a cloud seeding technique that involves twin
engine planes flying into thunderstorm clouds and injecting billions of
microscopic silver iodide particles. Can you imagine flying a tiny plane into a
thunderstorm cloud? Here’s how these particles mitigate hail damage:
Hail is
produced through strong to severe thunderstorm clouds which create really fast
currents of upward moving air, referred to as updrafts. These updrafts are
strong enough to push dust particles and water droplets to freezing
temperatures. The water droplets form around the dust particles, bonding
together and attracting more and more water particles. It takes 20-40 minutes
to produce hailstones. Once the hail is heavy enough, they drop to the ground.
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| Hail stones measuring 5 cm in diameter. You can see the nucleus in the hailstone on the right |
By
injecting the silver iodide particles into the hail producing clouds, the tiny
silver particles compete with the dust particles for moisture. What this does
is prevent hailstones from growing too large.
Essentially,
cloud seeding doesn’t take away hail; it just makes the hail much smaller, and
less likely to damage your property.
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| Silver Iodide Flares that are directly injected into cumulonimbus clouds |
So the next
time you see that massive dark cloud in the sky (you know the one: it’s that
cloud that looks like it’s reaching up to the sky, ready to unleash hail’s fury
at you), remember that there are brave pilots up there, trying to save you a
lot of time, stress, injury and money.
