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<br />EVALUATION OF THE HAIL SUPPRESSION COMPOI'l'ENT <br /> <br />Selection of An Ooerational Time Period Durin!! Which The Western Kansas Weather <br />Modification Pro!!Tam Was On!!oinl! <br /> <br />Crop hail insurance records were analyzed for the time period from 1979-1993, which <br />represents a time period during which annual cloud seeding activities were taking place <br />as a result of the Western Kansas Weather Modification Program and DO such activities <br />were occurring in the control area counties, listed below, or in any location that might <br />have an impact on hail suppression in the control counties. <br /> <br />Selection of a Historical Time Period Prior To Operation of the Western Kansas Weather <br />Modification Pro!!Tam <br /> <br />A historical time period fronI 1948-1970 was selected for comparison purposes, which <br />represented a period of time during which no weather modification activities occurred in <br />the vicifljty of the control or target areas. Thesears from 1942-1947 were not included <br />in this evaluation because the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation has indicated that hail loss <br />records have improved considerably just after World War IT in tenus of both coverage <br />and standardization. <br /> <br />Study Areas <br /> <br />A target area and a control area were selected as study areas for the hail suppression <br />evaluation. The target area consisted of all counties that have fully panicipated in the <br />Weather Modification Program each year from 1979-1993. These six counties were: <br />Finney, Ford, Greeley, Haskell, Kearny and Lane. <br /> <br />Figure 2 shows the target area in dark shading and the control area in light shading. No <br />portion of the control area received any cloud seeding activity during either of the two <br />time periods used for this study and it was not likely that any of the control area would <br />have been impacted by any cloud seeding activities occurring outside of the control area <br />or within the target area during either of the two time periods. The control area lies <br />entirely in Kansas and consists of Cheyenne, Rawlins, Decatur, Norton, Shennan, <br />Thomas, Sheridan and Graham counties. <br /> <br />The control area did not include an eastern portion because it was indicated that, due to <br />downwind effects, it would have been necessary to choose counties that were so far to <br />the east of the target counties that they would have had a different climate. <br /> <br />There was no southern portion of the control area because extensive cloud seeding <br />operations in northwest Oklahoma and some in northwest Texas, precluded the selection <br />of any control area counties that lie close to the southern portion of the target area. <br /> <br />13 <br />