Beijing will be shooting for the stars in a bid to stave off downpours when it hosts the Olympics Games in 2008.

Using an arsenal of rockets, artillery and aircraft, China will try to blast the clouds out of the sky, a meteorologist from Beijing told a Hong Kong newspaper, through a technique which falls under the umbrella of "cloud seeding."

"We sometimes turn a cloudy day into a dry and sunny one by shooting the clouds less intensively than when we make rain," head meteorologist Mian Donglian for the Beijing municipal weather bureau told The South China Morning Post.

By shooting shells containing chemicals like silver iodide, or dry ice into the sky, scientists say they can create rain. China has gone so far as to set up a weather modification office that is in charge of such an endeavor.

When the guns go off, they scatter crystals that attract water droplets in the cloud, making them grow faster, said climate and weather expert Johnny Chan from the City University of Hong Kong. The crystals become heavy and fall as raindrops, he said.

Planes, too, can be used to drop chemicals onto clouds to manipulate the weather.

In the case of the Olympics, climate experts will pore over satellite images to find ways to dissolve the clouds rather than make it rain.

"Scientists fly an airplane, sampling the cloud ... to see if there is potential for it to work, and if it is likely to work, they will shoot the gun," Chan said.

Page:

1

2