OPERATION VARUNA

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Rainmakers from US bring drought relief in Karnataka

 

 

 

Express News Service

 

 

 

 

Bangalore, August 18: Thirty minutes after cloud-seeding operations

were carried out on Monday, it rained for nearly 20 minutes, as

predicted by experts, at three places on the outskirts of the city.

 

Project Varuna, a 90-day cloudseeding operation for rains in drought-

hit Karnataka, was launched by Water Resources Minister H K Patil on

Monday. Patil and Public Works Minister Dharam Singh also flew in the

10-seater special aircraft, flown from the US for the purpose, to

watch the operations.

 

 

 

Karnataka ministers after the operation

The aircraft flew for 45 minutes at an altitude of 4,000 feet over

Rajanukunte, 20 km from Jakkur and burnt two cartridges of silver

iodide. ``The cloudseeding will continue for 90 days. It is round-the-

clock. We are satisfied with the technical details provided by the

experts and pilots,'' Patil said after the flight.

 

He said the Rs 5.65-crore project, being handled by US-based Weather

Modification Inc, was a ``sincere attempt'' by the state government

to use technology for the benefit of the people.

 

Patil said areas in interior Karnataka and catchment areas, where

deficient rains have been recorded, would be targeted using this

technique. He said 126 talukas in the state were facing severe

drought and 73 of them had received 30 per cent less than the average

rainfall.

 

Vice-President of Weather Modifications Inc. James Sweeny said his

firm had over 40 years of experience in conducting successful

cloudseeding operations in 60 countries. This is for the second time

in the last 20 years that the Karnataka has resorted to cloud-seeding

operations.

 

Cloudseeding, a technique for increasing rainfall or precipitation

using naturally occurring clouds, is effective only when suitable

clouds are present. To be successfully seeded, a cloud must be super-

cooled, ice-free and updraft.

 

The clouds should possess a sustained updraft of moist air, lack

natural ice and grow to heights cold enough to contain super cooled

liquid water. In the case of cloud systems where the precipitation

process is primarily cold, silver iodide, dry ice and compressed

liquid propane or carbon dioxide is used.

 

Base seeding aircraft releases the seeding agent into updrafts, right

under the developing storm, using a combination of wing-tip

generators and burn-in-place flares. Cloud top seeding aircraft use

ejectable flares and dry ice, which are released directly into super-

cooled cloud top.

 

Once the cloud is seeded, it takes about 30 minutes for the ice

crystals formed to grow to sufficient size and fall from the cloud

under their own weight. As ice falls, it passes through the melting

level and turns into rain.