Bill Gates thinks he can tame Hurricanes...

[msbae]

http://www.usatoday.com/weather/research/2009-07-15-gates-hurricanes_N.htm?se=yahoorefer&poe=HFMostPopular

I'll believe it when I see it, Bill.

Best of luck, though. Everyone here in New Orleans would breathe a sigh of relief if this crazy scheme actually worked.

 

[Meredith]

I would hate to see what happens when a Hurricane blue-screens.

 

[JustAFriend]

Yeah, anyone who's had a Windows machine roll over and die
REALLY wants to see Mr. Gates try to control a storm that can
kill tens of thousands of people and destroy entire cities....

 

[Zachary Smith]

[genewilderinyoungfrankenstein] "It . . . COULD . . . work . . . !! [/genewilderinyoungfrankenstein]

 

[TheGodBen]

 

[Drogo]

Yeah, anyone who's had a Windows machine roll over and die
REALLY wants to see Mr. Gates try to control a storm that can
kill tens of thousands of people and destroy entire cities....

Well, if it was Linux, it would only save about three percent....

And Apple would not work for less than a thousand dollars per unit.

 

[clint g]

It's bill gates. he has enough money to make it work

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

I can see a few things they'll need to overcome:

• The cold water that they pump up will tend to sink straight away, so they might need to pump a lot faster than they think.
• The pumps will emit heat, which might counteract the effect that is sought.
• Possible ecological damage to the ocean.

One possibility occurs to me -- as hurricanes die down when they reach land, why not tow a huge artificial island into their path (security system and 70's hippy types optional).

 

[Mr. B]

I'd love to see this work as much as anyone and I applaud Bill Gates and Co. for the proposal and efforts, but practically speaking I doubt any group or government would spend the obscene amount of money required for an attempt big enough to even have a real chance work making this work.

 

[Zachary Smith]

Clearly, what would be a better idea (not to mention more feasible) would be, rather than dredging cold water from the ocean's depths, to simply CRASH a comet into the path of the on-coming hurricane. They are, after all, merely giant slushy balls of ice and if you directed one large enough to be disruptive into the hurricane's path, the hurricane would be about the last thing you'd need to worry about.

 

[chardman]

Too bad noknowes isn't around anymore. His plan to use concert speakers to destroy tornadoes might also not work on hurricanes as well. That man's posts were comedy gold! Especially the serious ones!

 

[FordSVT]

It's a patent filing and a proposal, nothing more. From the OA:

"The bottom line here is that if enough pumps are deployed, it is reasonable to expect some diminution of hurricane power," says hurricane expert Kerry Emanuel of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is not part of the patent effort. Cutting sea surface temperature by 4.5 degrees under the eye of a hurricane would actually kill a storm, he adds. "This would have to be done on a massive scale, but is still probably within the realm of feasibility."
Says climate scientist Michael Mann of Pennsylvania State University in State College: "Needless to say, there is a whole lot of skepticism about this among tropical meteorologists. But it's not so ridiculous that I would actually dismiss it out of hand. There is certainly an important role of upper ocean mixing on tropical cyclone behavior."

But yeah, it would be an unparallelled mobile engineering effort. You'd need a huge fleet of ships spread out over hundreds of miles pumping millions of gallons of water per hour. But if a change in 4.5 degrees would effectively "kill" a hurricane, it's not unreasonable to expect a change in 1 or 2 degrees to significantly lessen its effect. Degrading a storm from a cat 3 or 4 to a cat 2 would save billions of dollars in damages and possibly many lives each storm.

It's the insurance companies that Gates and Co. should go after for R&D money.

 

[tharpdevenport]

Well, at least it's a safer idea than hte proposed nuclear bombs being discussed in another thread here for hurricane destroying.

 

[msbae]

Dude, that is EVIL...

One possibility occurs to me -- as hurricanes die down when they reach land, why not tow a huge artificial island into their path (security system and 70's hippy types optional).

Not all of them die down when they reach land. Louisiana does have a natural system much like this called the barrier islands. Unfortunately, they have been badly eroded by violent storms, man's meddling and time. Dumping lots of sand down on Grand Isle isn't likely to help, either.

 

[Zachary Smith]

What we need to stop hurricanes is just ONE good Kryptonian . . .

 

[tharpdevenport]

What we need to stop hurricanes is just ONE good Kryptonian . . .

Superdog?

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

One possibility occurs to me -- as hurricanes die down when they reach land, why not tow a huge artificial island into their path (security system and 70's hippy types optional).

Not all of them die down when they reach land. Louisiana does have a natural system much like this called the barrier islands. Unfortunately, they have been badly eroded by violent storms, man's meddling and time. Dumping lots of sand down on Grand Isle isn't likely to help, either.

That's true, it does take a while to calm the storm by removing its access to water. I was making a facetious suggestion for an impractical solution. It beggars the imagination how such a vast fleet of barges (running Windows 7 presumably) would fare under hurricane conditions.

 

[Zachary Smith]

What we need to stop hurricanes is just ONE good Kryptonian . . .

Superdog?

Fetch, boy! FETCH!

 

[Australis]

Wow, noknowes is gone? I didn't know!

Shame, no more witty repartee and philosophical scientific discourse of a level unmatched.

He would have loved this.

 

[Silvercrest]

Yeah! I miss him already!