China’s meteorological bureau guarantees good weather for Olympics

BEIJING, Feb. 1 - Beijing’s Meteorological Bureau announced yesterday at a Beijing Olympics Organizing Committee meeting that they are fully prepared to take control of the most unpredictable element in sports – the weather. China is a world leader along with the Russians in what is known as “weather modification science;” however this has usually been deployed to create rain, rather than eliminate it.

Cloud seeding for example has long been used by the Chinese since the 1950s to bring on downpours, particularly in the North, where desertification has eaten away at precious arable land resources, and trying to induce rain to fall in the drier provinces. There has been success – deserts are slowly waning in China and more land is being reclaimed. The Russians, too, have long been experts in this field – sophisticated rain seeding carried out over Chernobyl prevented much contaminated rain from reaching further than it did in the aftermath of the nuclear catastrophe. However, the reverse procedure – ensuring no rain falls – is little used. (more…)

The need for comprehensive due diligence was made painfully clear this weekend when The New York Times ran a report tracing the path of a toxic syrup from Panama where it lead to a reported 365 deaths, 100 which are confirmed, back to its production facility in the Yangtze River Delta. Walt Bogdanich and Jake Hooker write:

Forty-six barrels of the toxic syrup arrived via a poison pipeline stretching halfway around the world. Through shipping records and interviews with government officials, The New York Times traced this pipeline from the Panamanian port of Colon, back through trading companies in Barcelona and Beijing, to its beginning near the Yangtze Delta (more…)