France - 1769 onwards - Weather Modification
#8 - A summary of French weather modification activity.
France
France is (as far as I know) the first country to carry out 'science' based weather modification attempts. The term science based is used here as a comparison to pseudo fringe activities attempted before the 1900's such as 'rain-dancing' or other claimed techniques that involve humans 'commanding' the weather to change. It is more likely during the fringe style events that it was the fires used that gave atmospheric moisture, something to form around (particulates in the form of soot) and turn into rain droplets, than humans commanding the weather to change.
Some of the early information in this article was also featured in the 'Italian' article with regard to French activity. It is important to note that anti-hail projects were and are being carried out in the Alpine regions in various countries as a measure to avoid damage to grapevines. In other words, weather modification is being carried out so wine producers can produce and sell their products.
Anti Hail Sound Cannons and Cloud Seeding using cannons - Keep in mind these are early attempts at modifying the weather and 'sound cannons' are described in our current times as crude, early, pseudo-scientific attempts at weather modification. That statement works if you ignore modern versions of the technique. In Mexico in August 2018, farmers accused the vehicle manufacturer 'Volkswagen' (VW) of altering the weather. VW had installed 'hail cannons' at its Puebla production facility which fire shockwaves into the atmosphere to prevent the formation of hail stones (to prevent damage to new vehicles). So the technique is still being used, 250 years after France was initiating its use. The 'pseudo-scientific' claim doesn't have much value, except for disinformation objectives.
The 1700's
The concept of hail suppression and experiments related to it dates back to 1760 with projects being carried out in 1769 in France. The Professor of Physics and Meteorology, F. Houdaille, at the National School of Agriculture in Montpelier, France published a paper in 1901 (Paris) titled 'Les Orages A Grele et Le Tir Des Canons' (Hailstorms and Canon Firing), in which it was stated "A French physicist from Jacour proposed in 1760 in an article inserted in the Encyclopedia, the installation of firing stations to fight against storms of hail and 'Arago' reports in his memoir on the thunder, published around 1769, that the Marquis de Chevriers on his property in Vaurenard (Maconnais) was burning each year, 100 to 150 kilograms of 'mine powder' to defend against hail. At the beginning of the 19th century, several communes of Maconnais, Vaurenard, Azé, Romanèche, Fleury, employed mortars with a load reaching 500 grams of powder to ward off hail. This custom has survived (to 1901 when the paper was published) in some localities in the same region, but in the state of isolated shots on certain points of the vineyard."
The practice that was started in the 1760's was used for 140 years up to and surpassing the 1901 publication of 'Les Orages A Grele et Le Tir Des Canons'.
The 1900's
The 'Agence France-Presse' (French Press Agency) in association with the 'Wine-Searcher' website published an article in September 2013 titled "Cloud Seeding drifts from Beijing to Burgundy" which should create a red-flag due to referencing China. The "China does it, so it is ok for us to do it" rhetoric is obvious. The China/Russia bad, the West is good, neuro linguistic programming method, is a commonly found dogma in the world of weather and climate modification. China has been modifying its weather since 1958, 200 years after France started. The AFP article contradicts itself and the AFP itself has a 'fact-checking' publication/department. Claiming in 2013 that cloud seeding is being done in China and is coming to France is dis-information.
The illustrations (old paintings) associated with the AFP article which are copy-righted to 'Roger Viollet, the AFP and Leemage' have this accompanying description "The illustrations show Beaujolais vignerons using cannons circa 1900 as an early form of cloud seeding to prevent hail damaged vines." Further into the article China is referenced as an information point: "The Chinese government used cloud seeding to clear the air over Beijing during the 2008 Olympics and now Burgundy producers are considering adopting the technology." That is a clear statement that it is 'not happening' in France and requests for it to be introduced in 2014 are based on China's usage of the technology in 2008. In the same article the deputy chairman of the Burgundy Wine Board, Michel Baldassini states in the 2013 article that "cloud seeding is already used in the south of France, though the cost is high." It is worth considering why the AFP and Wine-Searcher outlets would take such a twisted approach to informing people on what is happening and has happened. Such contradictory statements only serve to confuse the reader about the truth.
1954
A 2022 UK FOIR included an unpublished paper, prepared by H.W.L. Absalom, which was "a paper of the Meteorological Research Committee (MRC), London." Written in February 1954. The MRC was part of the Air Ministry (MOD). The paper titled "Artificial production of precipitation" contained this statement by Absalom "Some reports of cloud-seeding in other countries are available (e.g., Canada , France, India, Israel, South Africa and United Kingdom), but are not considered to contain information which adds materially to that given in this memorandum." Which is more evidence on French activity.
1969
The 'Propane Method' is, in 2023/24, re-surfacing with both the United States and Iran claiming to of recently invented it. Both countries are lying about that as it has been around for decades. A United States Air Weather Service (AWS) technical report (177) published in September 1969 and authored by Herbert S. Appleman, titled "An Introduction to Weather Modification" states "Ground based systems using a network of fixed Propane dispensers are under test by the AWS and one such network is in operational use at Orly Airport in France.
1988 - 1995
The American Meteorological Society in its Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology (Vol. 37, Issue 12) published a paper in December 1998 written by Jean Dessens titled "A Physical Evaluation of a Hail Suppression Project with Silver Iodide Ground Burners in South-Western France" where it is clearly stated in the first sentence of the abstract that "The large-scale hail prevention program operated by the Association Nationale d’Etude et de Lutte contre les Fléaux Atmosphériques (ANELFA) in southwestern France combines the seeding of hail clouds by a network of silver iodide ground generators." The introduction of the paper goes further, stating "the scientists responsible for operational programs have reported successful results of hailstorm seeding from aircraft (Rudolph et al. 1994; Smith et al. 1997), from rockets (Mesinger and Mesinger 1992; Simeonov 1996), and from the ground (Dessens 1986)" although the success and outcomes of those operations were judged by 'hail damage insurance claims' and not actual meteorological data. According to the WMO in 1996 the usage of insurance data to confirm success in hail suppression operations should be seen as an invalid method. It is also stated in the abstract that "During the years 1988–95, 630 point (sized) hailfalls were recorded on 53 hail days with seeding", which, with re-considering the 2013 AFP article, should show clearly that introducing weather modification as something new in France for the 2014 growing season is a factual inaccuracy.
2016
In September 2016, the 'PRI' which is now called 'The World' outlet which according to their website is "public radio’s longest-running daily global news program", published an article by Adeline Sire titled "French Chablis makers can't take another tiny harvest. So they're bringing in anti-hail cannons" which again confirms that France is modifying its weather so that alcoholic beverages can be produced and sold. This is not just historically a factual statement but it is also happening during the 'climate crisis' where extreme weather events are occurring. The climate crisis is blamed for forest fires in southern Europe whilst at the same time, southern European countries are redistributing atmospheric moisture to wine growing regions causing drought in other areas due to the lack of atmospheric moisture. The article by Sire labels cloud seeding along with "some pretty wild weather contraptions" and claims the wine importer MacPhail is "dubious about the technology" which itself is a dubious statement based on the global usage of cloud seeding and France's weather modification history. The article states further that "40 cannons (ground based generators) will be set up in the Chablis area in 2017 which will spray (disperse) silver iodide into storm clouds." The same information was reported by the UK's, wine specific, trade news outlet 'Harpers' in October 2016.
2017
The re-writing of French weather modification history continued in April 2017 with an article published by 'Net-Weather-TV'. The author 'Nick Finnis' states in the first sentence of his article in regard to cloud seeding in France that "Vineyards in Burgundy in eastern France will be the first in the country, to be extensively protected by a ‘shield’ to help mitigate against damaging hail storms". You will know from what you have already read in this summary of French activity that the author of the net-weather-tv article is making false claims and basic research would of informed the author of the reality of what he is talking about in 2017. Nick Finnis who is the senior forecaster for net-weather and really should be more informed on what he is talking about refers in his article to information extracted from articles that were published in April 2017 in the UK's 'Telegraph' and 'Daily Mail', to back up his claim.
2021
The global wine journal 'Wine-Anorak' published an article based on facts in January 2021 but that did not end the re-writing of French weather modification activity as a 2022 'France 24' article will show. The wine-anorak article from 2021 states "Last week (27 January 2021) the winegrowers of Saint-Emilion decided to implement a joint hail defence network that will cover 7500 hectares, involving some 900 growers. The system is Selerys, and it involves a radar to detect potential hail clouds, and then a series of 37 launchers. These release helium balloons that get sucked up by the updrafts and then at the right altitude release 200 g of calcium chloride to act as a nucleating agent." Those of you that follow the climate modification subject area will recognise this cloud seeding method, now being trialled under the geo-engineering umbrella term, from papers and activities published by David Keith and also activities by companies such as 'Make Sunsets' and the 'Stratospheric Particle Injection for Climate Engineering' (SPICE) project. The previously mentioned 'ANELFA' is also referenced in the wine-anorak article, "ANELFA is a non-profit organization that began in the 1950s that studies and prevents hail in France."
2022
Back to how it is all China's fault and how France is new to the activity, 'France 24' published an article in August 2022 titled "Can technological fixes solve France's water crisis amid record droughts?" Anyone who has a basic understanding of atmospheric moisture re-distribution knows, which is backed up by numerous published papers and articles, the main consequence of weather modification, is that it causes drought in the area's that have had their atmospheric moisture (removed) re-distributed to another area. California (for hydro power), Canada (insurance claim mitigation) and Queensland, Australia (for hydro power) are good examples of this, but there are also other examples. Another example of a consequence is extreme snow/rain/hail events as seen in Pakistan and the UAE, just to name 2 more countries, of which there are many.
The 'France 24' article is interesting as each topic mentioned get's its own bullet-point headline except for weather modification which is under the headline 'Moving icebergs'. The article claims "cloud seeding has been studied since the 1960's", this is impossible to get wrong due to it being a point of known, basic information that the modern era of cloud seeding started in the 1940's. The article then states "particularly in China." France 24 is known as quite a 'respectable' news outlet so how do they come to the conclusion that "cloud seeding has been studied since the 1960's, particularly in China." when cloud seeding in France has been practiced since the early 1900's as cloud seeding and stretching back the 1760's through earlier methods? China started their weather modification activity in 1958 as mentioned at the beginning of this summary. This shows just how often 'China bad' is used in the western media. France 24 has no need to use China for reference points as there are more than enough reference points available from French activity since the 1950's.
Selerys
Selerys uses the LAICO system which is an advanced technologies solution that is 100% dedicated to hail risk mitigation. Selerys claim "Because of climate change, storms, including hailstorms, have increased by more than 350%. They are becoming more violent, more and more difficult to predict and are striking at any time, day or night. They are causing a lot of financial and material damage." When they say climate change they probably mean, previous, decades long, weather modification activities that have created a tipping point error in our natural weather systems.
The LAICO smart balloon, "With LAICO you’ll be able to seed the clouds in less than 10 minutes. Each balloon can embark either with 23g of silver iodide or 220g of hygroscopic salts, up to 2000m altitude, and fits with civil air regulations. LAICO smart balloons have a microchip embedded in it with the controls to light the flare that will spread the agent at the base of the cloud upon specific parameters." LAICO NOMAD: A light & flexible solution for cloud seeding. LAICO SOBBED: A self-operating instrument, remote controlled solution for aerial cloud seeding. Customers of Selerys include Hyundai, Krason, Louis Favel, Chateau Figeac as well as others. Selerys is based in Rousset, France.
ANELFA
Professor Henri Dessens founded a non-profit organization in charge of the development of techniques of artificial weather modification aimed at suppressing hail. ANELFA. This association, created in 1951, still exists and is today called the Association Nationale d’Etude et de Lutte contre les Fléaux Atmosphériques (Association to Suppress Atmospheric Plagues). Even ANELFA are mis-representing data, they state "This method was created about fifty years ago" where they then go on to reference the Bergeron / Schaefer & Vonnegut activity in the late 1940's which is the start of the modern era of silver iodide cloud seeding and not the start of cloud seeding in general. The ANELFA field activities take place each year from April to October. The target area for weather modification activity is distributed over 4 regions (1- central France, 1- south-east region and 2- in the south-west) and covering 55,000 square kilometres in total. Approximately 650 ground generators are manually operated by volunteers made up of farmers and wine growers.
Source
1769
https://web.archive.org/web/20220404141537/http://cma.entecra.it/Astro2_sito/doc/Orages_a_grele.pdf
Puebla, Mexico (VW) hail-cannons https://www.rt.com/business/436670-volkswagen-mexico-farmers-complains/
1900's
https://www.wine-searcher.com/m/2013/09/cloud-seeding-drifts-from-beijing-to-burgundy
China 1958
https://www.cma.gov.cn/en2014/news/Features/202111/t20211110_4232903.html
1954 - UK FOIR
https://antiweathermodification.weebly.com/france.html
1969 - Propane - AWS report - Orly airport
https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/AD0696619.pdf
1988 - 1995
https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/apme/37/12/1520-0450_1998_037_1588_apeoah_2.0.co_2.xml
2016
2017
https://www.netweather.tv/weather-forecasts/news/8105-cloud-seeding---hail-protection-for-vineyards
2021
2022
Selerys
ANELFA
https://www.anelfa.asso.fr/French_hail_prevention.html (English)
https://www.anelfa.asso.fr/ (French)
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Florida is being hit hard. Blue skies and sun are rare on the treasure coast. Looks like Gotham City