Seeding clouds ease hail damage
Posted Jul 13, 2010 12:59 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Damage from Monday’s hailstorm could have been worse.
Planes were in the sky yesterday seeding clouds ahead of the downburst as part of a weather modification program which has been up and running for 15 years.
A consortium of insurance companies decided to look at seeding clouds with silver iodide after years of summer thunderstorms which left behind hundreds of millions of dollars in damage.
Calgary lies in Alberta’s “hailstorm alley” which stretches from High River north to Rocky Mountain House.
Dave Walton with the Weather Modification Program tells 660News two crews were in the air yesterday and his weather modification plans have already logged 90 hours in the air this summer, which is more than all of last summer’s flights combined.
He says the measures can’t stop a hailstorm, but it can reduce the intensity and duration of it.
Walton adds a consortium of insurance companies pays for the work, believing the work will help reduce damage and in turn claims.
