back to article Earth resists NASA's attempts to make red and green clouds

NASA's attempts to make red and green clouds have been thwarted by Mother Nature. The aeronautical agency's cloud coloration cravings are, naturally, all in the name of science: the idea was to use a sounding rocket to launch “10 canisters about the size of a soft drink can” full of “vapour tracers” made of “barium, strontium …

  1. frank ly

    Blasted weather!

    "NASA warned people living in an area triangulated by New York, North Carolina and Charlottesville, Virginia they may see coloured clouds. But nature had other ideas."

    I suppose mass disappointment is better than mass panic.

    1. m0rt

      Re: Blasted weather!

      And funnier.

    2. Rich 11

      Re: Blasted weather!

      "Look, green clouds. Why's that happening?"

      "It's the End Times!"

      "No, it's the Martians!"

      1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

        Re: Blasted weather!

        UUUUUUlllaaaaaaa!!!

        1. Anonymous Custard

          Re: Blasted weather!

          They should just have timed the green clouds to coincide with Paddy's Day and all would be well...

    3. wayne 8

      Re: Blasted weather!

      The Great Disappointment happened in 1844.

  2. Neil Barnes Silver badge

    Off message

    Now if they'd instead proposed that the soft-drink-can-sized containers generated a red and white cloud in the shape of a well know, er, soft drink can, a well-known soft drink company would probably have thrown enough money at it to get all the other clouds out of the the way first.

    (other well-known soft drinks are available, but probably not in such easy colours.)

    1. Ugotta B. Kiddingme

      Re: Off message

      "(other well-known soft drinks are available, but probably not in such easy colours.)"

      One evening when the conditions were just right, with a high cloud deck that ended a few miles west of my position, the setting sun was able to illuminate the underside of that cloud deck with a color reminiscent of Irn-Bru. No additional boffinry required.

    2. Vinyl-Junkie
      Alien

      Re: Off message

      I would recommend finding a copy of the Asimov short story "Buy Jupiter"...

  3. jake Silver badge

    Can NASA read a map?

    "NASA warned people living in an area triangulated by New York, North Carolina and Charlottesville, Virginia "

    How do you get an area triangulated by those locations? That's two entire states and a largish city roughly midway between the two ...

    1. smartermind

      Re: Can NASA read a map?

      Even a triangle with a 0.1 degree angle is still a triangle. It might not be much on a map, but may be significant on the ground. Those three locations (the centre points of the two states and the "largish" city) do not form a straight line.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Terrier Improved Malemute Rocket

    if i had a rocket, that's how i'd call it.

    1. Steve Davies 3 Silver badge
      Coat

      Re: Terrier Improved Malemute Rocket

      Should have been called

      Terrier Improved Marmite Rocket

      Then it would have flown perfectly no matter what the weather.

      mines the one with a jar of the black stuff in the pocket. Marmite covered Soldiers dipped in runny egg. Yummies.

  5. Your alien overlord - fear me

    There is a well known saying

    Don't fuck with Mother Nature or Mother Nature will fuck you.

    1. Toltec

      Re: There is a well known saying

      "Don't fuck with Mother Nature or Mother Nature will fuck you."

      Which begs the question, which way around did the terrier malamute cross happen?

  6. MrAverage
    Thumb Up

    Strontium ... dogged

    Didn't even read the article, just wanted to give a shout to Johnny Alpha :D

    1. MrDamage Silver badge

      Re: Strontium ... dogged

      Strontium Fog. Sign me up for those gamma ray eyes.

      I'll get my coat. It's the one with the time bomb in the pocket. (leaving the puns about Wulf's "happy stick" alone)

    2. Simon Sharwood, Reg APAC Editor (Written by Reg staff)

      Re: Strontium ... dogged

      Ha! I was hoping someone would spot that. Made my day, this has.

  7. Doctor_Wibble
    Black Helicopters

    Chemtrails FTW

    Just when I was thinking I hadn't seen much from the chemtrail crowd lately, along comes this one, the rocket is clearly just a cover to pretend they weren't already using planes to spread the stuff. Possibly with added HAARP, I haven't seen that mentioned for a while either, did they all get abducted by aliens in cahoots with the illuminati?

    1. Ogi
      Black Helicopters

      Re: Chemtrails FTW

      > Just when I was thinking I hadn't seen much from the chemtrail crowd lately, along comes this one, the rocket is clearly just a cover to pretend they weren't already using planes to spread the stuff.

      Naaah, people are so conditioned to ignore the tin-foilers that the deep state can not only not have to deny it anymore, but can dye the chemtrails funky colours in the sky, and the public will still not believe the tin-foilers.

      I am sure it will drive the foilers nuts, especially as it is such a brazen public way of doing it!

      /me tightens my tinfoil-hat strap.

    2. Matthew 17

      Re: Chemtrails FTW

      Wasn't HAARP shut down?

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Frequency_Active_Auroral_Research_Program

      1. Doctor_Wibble
        Trollface

        Re: Chemtrails FTW

        > Wasn't HAARP shut down?

        That's what they want you to think, they do this big song and dance about shutting it down, and then a couple of weeks later they sneak back in and switch it on again.

        And obviously the secret one they kept in a shed behind the garage is still operating.

    3. allthecoolshortnamesweretaken

      Re: Chemtrails FTW

      The chemtrail crowd is busy following The Beloved Leader of The People's Democratic Republic of North America on twitter these days.

  8. Robert Moore
    Coat

    They obviously forgot to use: The Handymans Secret Weapon, Duct tape.

    In honour of the great man himself.

    http://www.redgreen.com/

  9. G R Goslin

    Clouds?

    Surely at that height, clouds, condensed vapours would not exist. What people would see (if they could), however is concentrations of ionised gases. It's nothing new, at least, on paper. Many years ago Analog, the SF magazine, ran a story on the very same theme. In this case, it was to warm a freezing planet, by reflecting more energy back to the planet's atmosphere. The cause of the freezing was a period of lower than normal solar activity, oddly rather similar to the present forecasts of reduced solar activity from our own sun.

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