25/09/2013
NEWS STORY
Despite talk of a "ten percent chance of rain" at various stages over the Singapore Grand Prix weekend it was never going to happen.
Fearing another Vettel walkover, broadcasters were left clutching at straws, warning at various times over the weekend that rain might turn the race on its head. Indeed, based on its usual sources even the Pitpass race hub indicated that there would be rain, storms even, over the course of the weekend.
However, we learn that in their determination to ensure the Singapore Grand Prix weekend is a perfect experience, nothing was being left to chance, not even the weather.
"It is currently Monsoon season in Singapore," a reader (Khun) informs us. "And we have rain basically every one or two days, for a period of an hour or so, mostly dropping more rain in one hour then you see in London in a twenty-four hour continuous rain shower.
"Singapore, the country, is managing the rainy season's influence on the F1 race assuring that rain doesn't fall during the weekend," they continued. "They use, as I understand, salt, that is "sprinkled" in the clouds heading to Singapore. This became proof, when the Singapore government confirmed a few months ago that - in order to fight the haze - they were cooperating with the Indonesian Government to tackle the haze, and Singapore was sprinkling salt in clouds, forcing rain to fall in the hotspot (burning forests) areas in Indonesia.
"The weather forecast on your website mentions rain and thundery showers right now, on Saturday 16:00 Singapore time. However, the official Singapore weather update site says it will be partly cloudy.
"On Wednesday (Sept 18), after two weeks of daily rain showers, the prediction on the Singapore weather website was rain for the next 3 days (Sept 19, 20 and 21). On Thursday, it changed to partly cloudy, zero rain, over the days that previously were predicted to show what your site shows: rain showers and thunder. Indeed, there hasn't been one drop of rain since.
"Last year, in the run-up of the Singapore GP, the exact same thing happened. Everything that Singapore does, they do well. Rain is a risk so it is eliminated."
The process, is known as cloud seeding, a principle first discovered in 1946 by Vincent Schaefer. Over the years the process has been used throughout Asia, in Australia, Europe, North America and Africa. Earlier this year it was used in Indonesian in an attempt to turn clouds into rain before they arrived in Jakarta which was suffering severe flooding which had seen the deaths of 41 people and millions left homeless.
So, next time you hear of X percent chance of rain during the Singapore Grand Prix you'll know what to say.
Let's hope the organisers at Spa, Silverstone or Montreal never opt to copy the idea.