Reply to post: Re: Re. storms

Re: Re. storms

Hurricanes have a very large energy flux by human standards. Even nuclear devices are popguns by comparison.

To change what a hurricane does, it would be necessary to affect the weather system far in advance, the same way a threatening asteroid would need nudging way before approaching Earth to have enough effect.

Trouble is, chaos gets a say. For the asteroid, the chaotic effects don't have time to operate since the "relaxation time*" for solar orbits is quite long. Not so with Earthly weather, which has a mere two day relaxation time. But two days is not nearly enough lead time to steer a hurricane, so we are stymied by a lack of predictive power. Otherwise, people COULD steer weather at enemies, at least in theory.

_{* Relaxation time for chaotic systems is the approx time it takes for the chaos to increase beyond the ability to calculate future states.}