Evening Star Newspaper, April 19, 1931, Page 90

Can Science Avert Another Ingenuity of Man Not Yet Able to Cope With the Problem of Supplying Mois- ture to an Arid Loarth, Despite All Attempts at Rain- making Within Recent Years. BY NELL RAY CLARKE. OW about the weather during the Summer of 1931? Will it be dry? Especially hot? Or will it be cool? Will last year’s drought tend to perpetuate itself a second Summer? Will we be deluged with floods to make up for the dearth of water during 1930? In other words, can science tell during the Spring months what the weather will be during the Summer? And if it could, can science do anything about it to change or mitigate weather conditions? These are some of the questions asked several Government weather officials in Washington. Since Nature played such a whimsical and dis- astrous trick on helpless humanity throughout the Central, Southern and Southeastern partis of tise United States during 1930 by denying the earth a normal water supply, most of us have become frightfully weather-conscious. All the officials agree on several points. In the first place, nobody knows that there will be a drought during 1931. Nobody knows what the weather will be. Long-range weather forecasting is an infant science which so far has given little indication of what kind of adult tendeneies it may manifest or along what lines #ts life may be molded. even if science knew exactly range, the humidity. the rainfall and all the factors of climate and weather—it would be able to do nothing to change those condi- Mark Twain's sage remark that “Every- body is always talking about the weather, but ever does anything about it,” holds just today as it did when it was uttered. individual who says that he can make in any way materially change the some laymen seem to fear. “Nature often seems to us ‘just $o try her- helf’ with contrariness, giving us intense heat for one period and then intense a climate such as that of rains—to give them a helping hand—thus averting another drought if the Spring rains fail to materialize?” Dr. Humphreys was asked. “No, not in my honest opinion,” Dr. Hum- phreys answered. “The only way to avert a drought, obviously, is to make rain. The only conceivable ways of making rain are by magic and by scientific methods. “We will ail agree that magic doesn’t work. Getiing out and sprinkling water around and telling the skies to do likewise is laughable in its absurdity. Rain comes only from the action of natural forces, and it cannot be produced artificia’ty by any known method. Savages have for centuries had their magic methods of making rain. “One of the earliest rainmaking practices was to pick out the tallest three trees in a given locality where rain was required. Then the most agile three members of the tribe were chosen. One was given a burning torch, a second a sprinkling can and a third a kettle and a club. From the treetops the man with the torch brandished it rapidly to simulate the lightning, the second beat lustily on the THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C, APRIL 19, 198L° Farmers throughout America will welcome regular occurrence of showers this year. kettle to imitate the thunder and the other vigorously sprinkled the earth with his water- ing can. “Beneath the trees the silly mortals danced and called out to their gods: ‘See, we are making rain. Now you do the same.’ “Most of the modern methods for making rain are just as ridiculous and unintelligent, and probably more unethical, for they are planned with the intention of collecting money “Aslw-cienuflc rainmaking methods, there are very few that are possible and not one of them is or can be practical the world instance, might possibly, under favorable comn- Through weird rites and incantations the Indians invoked the sun god to send them rain. An arrow shot into,the air told whence came the wind and possible showers. Droughtr stitution reading the pyrheliometer which measures the total radiation re- eeived from the sun. making rain. Science knows how to try, it knows the recipe if you will, but is Nature's task. It is too big beings to accomplish. “It's like telling somebody Washington Monument and walk off with it, Dr. Humphreys said. “I know myself. Buf show me the man Some jobs are on too big a strength of mere man and I'm that rainmaking is one of them, prof rainmakers to the contrary nothwithstanding.” For an answer to the question of whether science was making progress in long-range weather forecasting, Dr. C. L. Mitchell, princi- pal meteorologist of the Weather Bureau and one of the official forecasters for the Eastern district of the United States, was consulted. It was pointed out that trials in long: the world today, but that few of them, if can be said to be dependably successful. 18] parts of the world and what happens region some days or weeks later, IN California, at the Scripps Institute, similar work is being carried out il i no long-range forecasting has ever been made or 1s likely to be made with any consistent ac- curacy in this country,” Dr. Mitchell said. “Now and then we can foresee gemeral condie i i where, I might add, we have exceedingly cient news services to broadcast the caprices of the weather. “The drought and the accompanying mild Winter we have had in the vicinity of Wash- ington is no indication that climatic conditions “Nature enjoys her little vagaries and is like the enigmatic siren whose tempers and moods no one can foretell. We know, generally speak- ing, that the temperature is liable to range be- tween zero and 100 degress Fahrenheit in the zone of the United States, but beyond that we would not dare to predict. It would not be un- thinkable for us to have a stretch of sub-zero weather in the Winter and a period of tropical heat in the Midsummer, as we had last year “How to predict weather more than 10 days ahead of time in this part of the country we do not know. If we are ever able to accomplish it, the local weather bureau will have to have at hand weathar charts showing conditions all over the world simultaneously.”