Annals Of Inanity–HurricaneBusters: I’m just guessing, but if you lived in South Florida right now, you might be particularly receptive to ideas–any ideas–that could help thwart the parade of hurricanes that is turning the Sunshine State into the Stormwatch State. And as it happens, over the decades the dreamers, the crackpots, and the mad scientists out there have come up with some pretty creative ideas. Let’s do a quick TWC review:

The wacky: coat the surface of the sea with olive oil to flatten the water; tow a massive iceberg into Florida waters to cool surface temps; build giant fans to blow the hurricane offshore or onto some deserving neighboring community.

The wild: fly a 747 into the eye of a hurricane and release super-absorbent powder to suck all the moisture and energy out. Seriously. This one was proposed by Peter Cordani, chief operating officer of Dyn-O-Mat, a company that sells environmental absorbent products. At a minimum, Cordani says, he could knock a hurricane like Ivan down a category or two. He also claims to have made a thunderstorm disappear off Miami beach during a test run. The government’s response (yup, believe it or not, they looked into it): “It would really take all of the military heavy-lift aircraft that the United States has to carry the material, and there would be a major air traffic control problem around the eye.”

The Way, Way, Out There: Okay, here it is. Just nuke the sucker. Really. That’s been proposed and analyzed. So far, no one wants to go ahead with it. You see, there’s that annoying little problem of fallout. But who knows? Maybe the day will come. The government spent three decades playing with ideas in a secret “weather modification” research program called “Project Stormfury.” And you know they got to playing around with ALL their toys…



“Go ahead. I’ll swallow your puny little nuke and spit out Armageddon….”