I watched a NOVA program about the deadly 2011 tornadoes last night. One of the tornado researchers they interviewed said some thing to the effect that the way to prevent such tragedies is to improve warning systems, so that people get warned hours in advance.
Today I see that weather forecasters are predicting strong tornadoes in the Midwest for tomorrow. 24-hours warning; that’s pretty good. So, everyone in the danger zone should head to their safe-rooms or basements until Sunday.
The problem is, for many people, that’s unfortunately not practical. That’s why the idea of tornado prevention fascinates me so much, even though I suppose it’s more likely that we will figure out how to mass-produce tornado-proof buildings before we learn how to do that. I posted about it earlier this year, and I still wonder about how we could go about preventing tornadoes.
My layman’s understanding is that tornadoes form when a cold front hits a warm front, so it seems to me that something to either cool the warm front or warm the cold front is in order. So, why wouldn’t putting silver iodide into the warm front help? (Obviously it wouldn’t, because we’re not doing it, but I still don’t quite understand why.)