Triggered Lightning, Triggers Thunder, Triggers Rain

Triggered Lightning - Triggers Thunder - Triggers Rain
Does Lightning Make It Rain?

In past articles I've introduced the subject of "cloud tipping". Clouds which are made up of hundreds, and thousands of tons of water, dust, and other particulates have saturation points at which precipitation must occur.

I've stated that each cloud should be viewed as a four dimensional mountain of statistical probabilities of precipitation. It should be possible to develop methods of scanning clouds to locate these rain tipping points within clouds.

I've also reviewed "precipatory sheeting effects" in which precipitation triggers condensation, and further precipitation in contiguous areas within clouds.

Locating a cloud's tipping points, and triggering precipitation at one or more of these points, would spread precipitation throughout an entire cloud.

In previous post in this series on weather modification I have asked, "Does Thunder Make It Rain?".

I've graphically illustrated how thunder (sonic booms), passing through clouds could condense water vapor into rain droplets - rain droplets which would then fall to the ground as rain.

If thunder triggers precipitation within clouds then lightning must play an important role in precipitation - a role that remains unexamined.

The Never Ending Mystery Of Lightning
Magic Spark In A Scientific Age.

In nearly every main stream media article written over the last thirty years, in which lightning is the subject, a mysterious dog & pony show somehow creeps into center ring.

Lightning is reviewed in terms of its velocity, voltage, frequency, and other properties, but somehow despite decades of study the nature of it's origin remains shrouded in mystery.

The mantra of "the mysterious nature of lightning" which has been repeated by science writers to the general public over the last half century has crowded out what could have been a more revealing, and demanding discussion of this phenomena.

Lightning, we are told, possesses a mysterious inherent complexity currently beyond human understanding. Yet the gods of water, dust, wind, and sky continue to conspire, and produce lightning - as if it were child's play.


What is simple for clouds to produce is too complex for people to understand.

Once the shroud of mystery surrounding the nature of lightning is lifted, this important phenomena can then be discussed in practical terms. One day in the not too distant future remotely piloted vehicles may take to the skies above thunderstorms. These aircraft may be equipped with technology capable of generating artificial lightning, or triggering natural lightning with the goal of shaping rainfall patterns on the ground below.

In that distant age humankind may see weather as the result of decision, and policy, instead of as random natural acts, or acts of god.