The magician who says he can make it rain: Dr. Graciela Raja

PhD in Atmospheric Sciences Graciela Benemélis de Raja, an expert from the Department of Atmospheric Sciences of the Institute of Atmospheric Sciences and Climate Change of UNAM, in an interview with El Siglo de Torreón, strongly criticized the “bombardment” of clouds.

In the first part of the interview, Dr. Raja raised how climate change will impact northern Mexico, making extreme events such as drought and rain more intense in value and duration.

The pollution, aerosol and cloud expert said that because of the diversity of climates in Mexico, some of the changes in both temperature and precipitation will be less in the mid-21st century or at the end of the 21st century in the southern states than in the northern states, so he believes it is important for the north to prepare.

During the interview, Dr. Raja mentioned that the rains would be more intense. In response to the comment that the government would now have to “block” or “seed” the clouds until the rain patterns returned to what they were before, she replied:

“I originally did a PhD in cloud physics, so we’ve known about this for decades, imagine I’ve been working at UNAM for 30 years. So there’s no consensus or scientific evidence on how these little planes do the ‘seeding’ process. It gives a result.” .

“They don’t validate their results, so what I can say is that the World Meteorological Organization has a group of experts who meet regularly and evaluate the studies that are being done, in the most rigorous studies, the most you can see is a 10 percent increase in rainfall under very controlled conditions because this ‘seeding’ control method is not controlled.”

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clouds

“The variation in the atmosphere from one cloud to another is very important, so as a cloud physics expert, I have a more trained eye and can tell which cloud is going to rain, if I’m a pilot,” he describes enthusiastically. From that cloud.” The plane I’m going to that cloud, because that cloud is going to rain.”

“Before the seeding, it may have rained, so in the most rigorous studies, the pilot cannot decide which cloud to go to, and even less so if there is a scientist on board because it is an aircraft equipped with instruments to make the relevant measurements inside the cloud and we see that it actually changes.

She specifies that clouds on continents are made up of more diverse particles such as soil and vegetation, and there are “bioparticles” (bacteria and fungi) on which the ice crystals and droplets that make up the cloud can form, so with “seeding” “it’s about adding more, when there is already enough to form clouds, but they won’t form if there is no moisture to begin with.

“He is a charlatan who says that he can make it rain if there is a desert.”

He states that “there is a reason why the Gobi Desert, the Arabian Desert, the Sahara Desert, those deserts do not rain in the climate we have now, because there is no water vapor.”

“In northern Mexico there is no water vapor, nor in the southeastern United States unless we are in July or August, which is the time when seasonal rains fall due to the change in the direction of the winds, so the Pacific winds bring moisture to the atmosphere on the slopes, and since there are mountains, it rises.” air and clouds form.

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“When they want rain after we are in the middle of a drought, they are charlatans and only get money from the government, which has to respond because farmers complain,” says Dr Raja.

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