When NDTV Flew In A Plane That Makes, Studies Artificial Rain

A successful test run done, Delhi is set to witness its first artificial rain on October 29, bringing relief from air pollution after AQI dipped dangerously after Diwali. The science of creating artificial rain was witnessed by NDTV's science editor Pallava Bagla when he flew in a plane that studied the outcome.

NDTV's 2018 flight comes into focus as Friday's trial saw small amounts of silver iodide and sodium chloride - compounds used to induce artificial rain - being released from an aircraft over Delhi's Burari area. Cloud seeding typically requires a moisture level of around 50 per cent. Since the area only had under 20 per cent moisture in the air, no rainfall occurred.

The Ministry of Earth Sciences had in 2018 launched a massive experiment in Maharashtra to understand the business of cloud seeding, at a time the year's monsoon was below par for the entire country.

Two special planes were hired for the job. While one was to seed the clouds with a special formulation of benign chemicals like calcium and potassium chloride, the second plane was a flying laboratory to analyse the outcome of the experiment.

The experiment, Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology's Thara Prabhakaran told NDTV, was about the science of seeding clouds and to ascertain whether it rains or not after. "We need to know how much rain it can make and under what conditions," she had said.

Prabhakaran had added that the experiment would look at the warm part of monsoon clouds to see if cloud seeding works.

As for the upcoming trial, the Delhi Cabinet had approved a proposal in May to conduct five cloud-seeding trials at a total cost of Rs 3.21 crore. The exercise faced repeated delays due to unfavourable weather conditions and the onset of southwest monsoon, with deadlines being pushed back from May-end and early June to August, September, and most recently, the second week of October.