WMOD00152

• Applicant: W. Kansas Groundwater Management Dist. #1
• Project Name: Cloud Seeding/14 western Kansas countries
• Date: 10/1/1979
• Weather Modification - Doc Type: Report

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2. The Beukers semi-automatic rawinsonde unit was
relatively accurate and trouble free.
3. Stronger emphasis should be placed on public infor-
mation, particularly the issuance of local interest news items.
4. There are good sources of hail occurrence and crop
damage data which should be formally exploited, such as county
sheriff offices, county ASCS offices, and Extension Service offices.
Post-storm interrogation (manpower and funds permitting) of these
agencies on a systematic basis should greatly strengthen the day to
day assessment of seeding effects.
5. Through the efforts of the KWRB, hail damage claim
bulletins were acquired from the regional insurance underwriters.
These bulletins listed damage claims by date, township, and crop
affected, and were usually available in less than two weeks after a
storm. Plots of these hail damage claims, when combined with
storm paths recorded from radar and the seeded cloud locations, were
very useful for post-operational assessment of seeding effects.
Every effort should be made to continue making these bulletins avail-
able to the Muddy Road operators.
6. Electronic equipment failures discussed in Section
V, .Par. D are examples of those which might be expected with
weather modification equipment. Consideration should again be given
to the assignment of a full time electronic equipment technician.
7. A factor which contributed to frequent delays in
aircraft turn around was that of pilot rest and food break. The one
pilot per aircraft allocation also proved to be a limiting factor when
one pilot was grounded due to illness. The addition of an additional
pilot to the Lakin staff would permit much more effective utilization

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