Tomorrow's Forecast: Sunny Skies

The 32nd G8 summit just finished up on Monday in St. Petersburg, Russia. I found something pretty awesome as I was reading about it.

The day before the summit, three Russian Airforce M-17s flew over the area releasing a bunch of chemicals into the stratosphere. This induced heavy overnight rainfall and cleared the air of excess humidity. Russia did this to ensure sunny, pleasant weather for the summit. Sure enough, St. Petersburg had clear, blue skies and 68-degree weather this weekend. They also kept some planes on standby over the weekend as a contingency plan in case bad weather cropped up again.

Apparently, Russia has used this technology to guarantee nice weather for some national holidays too, according to trusty ol' Wikipedia. Goodness! Isn't that crazy?! And awesome?! I mean, what if you could do that to make sure your rafting trip doesn't get rained out. Or you could ensure clear skies for those pesky Trick-or-Treaters on Halloween. OR if you wanted, you could purposely induce a blizzard on the night that your evil in-laws were supposed to be flying in for Thanksgiving dinner. Hmm.

Too bad it cost 20 million rubbles for the G8 summit. I'm sensing a market that needs to be expanded. Any entrepreneurs out there who feel like entering and dragging down some prices?