Hurricane abatement patent

[Jody Radzik]

I'm not qualified to comment on this, but thought it might be of interest here:

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn16172-invention-supersonic-hurricane-neutraliser.html

"In a patent application, Leonov and colleagues say that they can put a spanner in the atmospheric works by flying supersonic jet aircraft in concentric circles around a hurricane's eye, the calm area around which the storm rotates.

The idea is that the sonic-boom shockwave would dramatically raise air pressure in the eye, disrupting the upward flow of warm air that drives the hurricane.

But how many planes would you need? Sonic booms spread out as they travel away from an aircraft, so even a small number of relatively small aircraft could do the job, say Leonov and colleagues.

"Two F-4 jet fighters flying at approximately Mach 1.5 are sufficient to suppress, mitigate and/or destroy a typical sized hurricane/typhoon," they claim in their application."

 

[Greg Campbell]

Oh, yea, sure!

A momentary displacement wave is going to completely disrupt millions of tons of air and water moving at extreme velocity. Riiiiiiight.
Maybe it's the Hail Cannon mounted in the wing that does the trick!

It's a shame that any number of Junk Science magazines and web sites make a living peddling this sort of idiocy. They contribute nothing to our society.

 

[Jody Radzik]

It's a shame that any number of Junk Science magazines and web sites make a living peddling this sort of idiocy.

I'm not sure I'd characterize New Scientist as a "junk science magazine," yet I believe they included this patent application for its wackiness factor as much as anything else, which puts it right back in the "junk" category, at least for some. Generally, though, they track science news quite well, in my layman's opinion.

 

[Chris Nuttall]

Trying to disrupt and dissipate hurricanes probably isn't a good idea anyway. Remember, hurricanes are basically big heat engines. They are one of the major mechanisms of redistributing heat between the Equator and the poles.

 

[cdcollura]

Good day,

What fails to be realized that this is putting MORE energy (acoustically) into a hurricane - Otherwise, it would have no effect.

Shock waves have been known to increase precipitation, a loud thunder clap followed by an increase in rain accounts for this. In a tropical system, it would only affect a TINY piece of the eyewall.

Also, sonic booms will cause damage on the ground (if the hurricane does not break a window, the sonic boom would).

Most importantly, HURRICANES exist for a GOOD reason. They TRANSFER energy. Interfering with this natural process can cause many other side-effects far worse (and over a larger area) than the hurricane itself.

 

[Terry Tyler]

i dont know, it sounds like a crazy idea but i would be interested to see what it could do...chris makes a good point about hurricanes being needed to transfer heat and energy out of the atmosphere, although i dont think they want to destroy them altogether just weaken them prior to landfall...

either way, i highly doubt it would work but who knows...i know one thing though, it would be a hell of a ride on that airplane, you couldent pay me enough to do that!

 

[Rob Wadsworth]

Severe thunderstorms - even average ones - theoretically contain as much energy potential as a Hiroshima bomb - or so I have read somewhere. A HURRICANE contains this energy potential - except multiplied several times comparatively. It is useless - or proudly foolish for man to think he can dissipate this force - unless with prayer and divine intervention.

Indeed, storms are a part of nature that serves a purpose in creation. If one wants to harvest the storm potential thru wind power or save some water in a dam, that can be done. But if one wants to stop the devastation of storms; then one must learn to simply stay out of their way. If one wishes to live in Florida - then one must also consider the inevitable.

If one wishes to stop a hurricane or control its forces, then one must realize man's inadequacy in organizing enough energy to counter it. Sound waves, cloud seeding, and so on - are both vain and primitive forms of man's conceit that blinds his eyes and makes him forget his place in the order of nature. The only one that I know of that was able to silence the storm was Jesus - on the Sea of Galilee - to demonstrate to his disciples that He was/is at the top of nature's controls as Lord - and to those that believe in Him that nothing is impossible.

In truth, I wouldn't want to see man finally have the say with weather. If man cannot keep porn off of the internet, cannot balance a governmental budget, or stop being so greedy that he cannot avoid wars and taking/dominating what someone else has - then I surely don't want to see him take responsibility for something that it as important as the rains that we need to fall.
IMHO...

 

[Stuart Robinson]

I Agree with Chris – the Atmosphere (which is constantly trying to balance its temperature profile) NEEDS a hurricane in order to do so. It is the same with a thunderstorm forming within a high CAPE environment, again to balance the thermal profile at that location.

The only way I can see to reduce the effect of a Hurricane is to ether warm the upper atmosphere or cool the oceans.

 

[Jeff Snyder]

The only way I can see to reduce the effect of a Hurricane is to ether warm the upper atmosphere or cool the oceans.

Interestingly, this is exactly what a hurricane essentially does (I think you're saying the same thing, so I'm merely reiterating what you said). Energy (in the form of heat and latent heat associated with water vapor) is transferred from the warm ocean to the cooler upper troposphere. If we want to have an appreciable impact on ocean SSTs or upper-tropospheric temps, we'll need to find a way to remove tremendous amounts of energy from the water and/or introduce a tremendous amount of energy to the mid- and upper-troposphere.

Just a brief math estimation based on some back-of-the-envelope math... Suppose that a thunderstorm produces an average of 1" per hour rain over a 15 km x 15 km square region. In terms of mass, 1.6x10^6 kg of water falls over this area per second (rate of 7.1x10^-6 m/s over the area equates to ~1587.5 m3 of rainfall per second) and, therefore, that amount of water is converted from vapor to liquid each second (i.e. 1.6x10^6 kg/s). Given latent heat of condensation, that amounts to ~1.3x10^13 J/hr associated with condensation. According to a quick Google search, the nuclear bomb dropped on Hiroshima released approx 6.3x10^13 J. So, this thunderstorm that is producing "only" 1 in/hr rain over a 15km x 15 km area releases the equivalent of one nuke every 5 hours. Now, consider a big MCS with a leading-convective region producing isolated 2-3 in/hr rainrates and spanning a couple hundred of miles... That's a LOT of energy!

 

[Tom Mitchell]

Awesome...I can't wait to see half of the active fighters in the Air Force lined up so that they could each spend 3 hours on the ground for maintenance, 2 hours in transit, just to spend 1 minute at afterburner in the eye...

I highly doubt 2 planes would do anything, since if a sonic boom is all that is necessary, the lightning that exists in the eyewall of (not that much lighting occurs...but certainly 2 planes worth) would wipe out the storm on its own...