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feld (feld@friedcheese.us)'s status on Sunday, 06-Oct-2024 09:58:21 JST feld
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- Mike Malaska
@mike_malaska worth mentioning Operation Popeye in Vietnam was where we got good at cloud seeding

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  Mike Malaska (mike_malaska@deepspace.social)'s status on Sunday, 06-Oct-2024 09:58:33 JST Mike Malaska
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  In the book 'Cat's Cradle' by Kurt Vonnegut (great book, btw.) a seed crystal of "ice-nine" causes worldwide devastation as it makes water turn to a solid at room temperature.
  Amazingly, it was Kurt Vonnegut's older brother, Bernard Vonnegut, who discovered that silver iodide could be used to seed clouds by serving as the nuclei for ice crystals.
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernard_Vonnegut
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    Bernard Vonnegut
    
    Bernard Vonnegut (August 29, 1914 – April 25, 1997) was an American atmospheric scientist credited with discovering that silver iodide could be used effectively in cloud seeding to produce snow and rain. He was the older brother of American novelist Kurt Vonnegut. Early life Vonnegut was born in Indianapolis, Indiana to architect Kurt Vonnegut Sr (November 24, 1884 – October 1, 1957), a partner in the firm of Vonnegut, Wright & Yeager, and homemaker Edith Sophia Lieber (d. May 14, 1944). He was named after his grandfather, architect Bernard Vonnegut Sr, co-founder of the firm of Vonnegut & Bohn. He attended Park School in Indianapolis and earned a B.S. in chemistry (1936) and Ph.D. in physical chemistry (1939) from Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Professional career In 1945, Vonnegut started work at the General Electric Research Laboratory in Schenectady, New York. It was there, on November 14, 1946, that he discovered that silver iodide could be used as a nucleating agent to seed clouds. Seeding clouds involves inserting large quantities of a nucleating agent into clouds to facilitate...
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  Mike Malaska (mike_malaska@deepspace.social)'s status on Sunday, 06-Oct-2024 09:58:41 JST Mike Malaska
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  So yes, in rare instances, humans can make rain happen by seeding clouds. They spread silver iodide (AgI) crystals into the clouds. Silver iodide is not soluble in water and one of it's crystal forms is hexagonal and mimics ice. The water molecules fit right in. The silver iodide crystals serve as "seed" nucleation centers and the water molecules glom onto them in the form of ice. They get bigger, heavier, and drop to make rain.
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silver_iodide
  
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  Mike Malaska (mike_malaska@deepspace.social)'s status on Sunday, 06-Oct-2024 09:58:48 JST Mike Malaska
  - Daniel Swain
  Imma gonna spin off a thread posted by @weatherwest
  Can we change the course of hurricanes? (No. Definitely not yet.)
  Can we affect weather? Why, yes. Sorta.
  And this thread is going to be a very wild ride.
  We will cover:
  Kurt Vonnegut.
  Crystal structures.
  Agricultural frost damage.
  Biotechnology and society.
  and, of course #astrobiology
  Buckle up.
  Here we go....
  [1/n]
  
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