Designer Wedding Day Weather for $150,000

What would you pay to ensure a perfect wedding day if money were no object? Travel company Oliver's Travels is offering customers what may be the ultimate in VIP services — weather modification.

From the company's website:

We’re proud and just a little bit excited to be able to offer an exclusive ‘cloud-bursting’ service to our customers, 100% guaranteeing fair weather and clear skies for when you tie the knot! Upon requesting the service, a crack team of pilots and meteorologists will begin meticulously planning the operation, which takes about three weeks and utilises particles of silver iodide to condense the water vapour from clouds into rain. Costs start at £100,000, but then this is some superhero-style weather modification we’ve got going on here – and what price perfection?

The cloud seeding service is currently only available for weddings taking place in France but if it proves popular, the company plans to expand it into the UK in the near term.

a reply to: theantediluvian

That's interesting. 100% guarantee. If you look at the bulk of information about cloud seeding, there is quite a bit of question about it's viability. Would that cloud have rained without help?

Despite some successful tests, cloud seeding still has many problems. The fundamental concern is: Does it work? It may be a chicken-and-egg conundrum -- would it have rained in a given area without the use of cloud seeding, and would it have rained less? Cloud seeding also depends heavily on environmental conditions like temperature and cloud composition.

link

Sure sounds good on paper though.

While cloud seeding is somewhat effective in producing rain (it's used often in Texas) I doubt it would have the ability to disperse an entire weather pattern to create clear skies for your wedding. I'm not familiar with the rain of France, but in Texas, the right weather pattern could bring thunderstorms for the majority of a day, and rain for the majority of several days. Doubt they could stop it.

a reply to: theantediluvian

As if the weather isn't causing enough problems around the world already, let's manipulate it further for things as ridiculous as weddings.

Seems like a safe business plan to me.

Get some sucker to dish out 150K and hope rain doesn't come into the forecast.

a reply to: Zarniwoop

That's what I was thinking with the guarantee thing. You could sit in the office and not even gas up the plane and just gamble. All you need is 1 or 2 wins a month and you return the misses.

For 1 million dollars, I guarantee a nice day in June anywhere in the US. If I am wrong, I'll gladly refund your money.
Send checks or money orders to........

a reply to: ShadowLink

Cloud seeding is localized. If it even works, it won't affect anything globally.
www.weathermodificationinc.com...

If weather modification was ineffective, offered no benefits, and was a crapshoot, governments wouldn't be so heavily vested in it. They see the short and long-term benefits of the technology, beyond seeding, or they wouldn't bother.

As to this business, they won't be in it very long if they're gambling with that 100% guarantee. A handful of refunds, and they're out of business.

a reply to: ShadowLink

Weather =/= climate.

What a spectacular waste of brain power.

a reply to: zazzafrazz

People in glass houses...

a reply to: GetHyped

Why did you out of nowhere post an insult to me and move off topic?

the stench of bovine excrement is strong in this tail . cloud seeding CAN make a cloud more likley to rain - but it( cloudseeding )[ nor any known technology ] can stop a cloud raining .

this disturbs me - for one reason - with these idiots claiming " garunteed weather " for a specified location and date

they are going to turn to "desperation measures " and with only one " technique " - silver iodide seeding - they will be forced // tempted to over-use it to eliminate all rain bearing clouds in the region - in advance of the appointed day

therein lies the problem

Geo-Engineering for marriages = OK
Geo-Engineering to give rain to poor peoples crops = Not OK

I sincerely hope that laws come into place to stop practices like that, especially for something so self-righteous and useless.

originally posted by: network dude
a reply to: ShadowLink
Cloud seeding is localized. If it even works, it won't affect anything globally.

Really? Is weather not a dynamic system?
The weather in one area or region affects another as it travels along it's course.

If we cloud seed to stop or increase rain in one area, will that not change the affect further down the line?
This quote from Wikipedia weather page addresses my concern perfectly.

"The atmosphere is a chaotic system, so small changes to one part of the system can grow to have large effects on the system as a whole."

a reply to: Klassified

Looks like they have some clauses for severe weather systems based on the FAQ. It's already well established that cloud seeding works and as to its effectiveness for "cloud bursting", the Telegraph was reporting on this topic and said that cloud seeding was used to disperse clouds during the opening and closing ceremonies of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing as well as during the wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton in 2012.

Surprisingly, nobody seems to have argued either of the points that first occurred to me:

What size area are they seeding and should a company be able to alter the local weather for other people in order to disperse clouds for a wedding? I could see the potential for lawsuits from bystanders impacted in the process.

What are the impacts to health and the environment from spraying silver iodide to seed clouds and is it cumulative?

originally posted by: theantediluvian
What are the impacts to health and the environment from spraying silver iodide to seed clouds and is it cumulative?

LOL, it depends on whom you ask.

9) Does cloud seeding have any significant negative environmental impacts?

There is no evidence that suggests cloud seeding creates any significant negative environmental impacts on the environment. Measurements made since the 1950’s indicate that the amount of silver iodide deposited in a target area after a long standing cloud seeding project falls several orders of magnitude (multiples of 10) short of the amount known to be toxic to plants, animals, trees, or humans. It is often difficult to detect any silver accumulation above the background amounts naturally present in the environment. Naturally, this kind of investigation continues. See FAQ #10, “Is Silver Iodide Harmful to the Environment?”

Warm cloud seeding is not conducted nearly as frequently as silver iodide cloud seeding, and the effect of warm cloud seeding agents on the environment is not as well known. Warm cloud seeding agents are salts. Preliminary results suggest that because the amounts of seeding agent used are so small, even these warm cloud seeding materials probably do not have any significant impacts.

link to a source that promotes cloud seeding

Or

When studying the efficacy and consequences of cloud seeding experiments, the experimenters tend to be biased in saying cloud seeding with silver iodide enhances precipitation without negative consequences. However, much of the literature substantiates that not only does cloud seeding fail to achieve the desired effect, it also yields harmful consequences. Some of these consequences include rain suppression, flooding, tornadoes, and silver iodide toxicity. (1,2,3)

link to the other side of the coin.

Pick the one that makes you smile the most.

originally posted by: ShadowLink

originally posted by: network dude
a reply to: ShadowLink
Cloud seeding is localized. If it even works, it won't affect anything globally.

Really? Is weather not a dynamic system?
The weather in one area or region affects another as it travels along it's course.

If we cloud seed to stop or increase rain in one area, will that not change the affect further down the line?
This quote from Wikipedia weather page addresses my concern perfectly.

"The atmosphere is a chaotic system, so small changes to one part of the system can grow to have large effects on the system as a whole."

Yes, it can affect another system if it worked. But that would also be localized. Don't just take my word for it, look up what cloud seeding is and how it's done. It's a very small application, like one storm cloud at a time. The planes that do it are small prop jobs with flares usually. You may be thinking of geo-engineering which is something altogether different, and as far as facts show, isn't being done yet.

Wanna talk about old news? The russians have been doing this for quite some time..
Only if I can pro..... wait a minute.. I can..

Russian Cloud Seeding gone WRONG

"A pack of cement used in creating ... good weather in the capital region ... failed to pulverize completely at high altitude and fell on the roof of a house, making a hole about 80-100 cm (2.5-3 ft)," police in Naro-Fominsk told agency RIA-Novosti.

Ahead of major public holidays the Russian Air Force often dispatches up to 12 cargo planes carrying loads of silver iodide, liquid nitrogen and cement powder to seed clouds above Moscow and empty the skies of moisture.

This idea is so old it makes my cement hard already..

:EDIT:
The ATS post is from 2008.

...And another Back to the Future 2 prophecy comes to life, kind of half-assedly.