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Article: Hail, no! Can giant cannons protect farms from hail damage?(hailstones)
- Article from:
- Current Science, a Weekly Reader publication
- Article date:
- October 6, 2006
- Author:
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A big storm is brewing over Colorado's vast San Luis Valley, but the deep booms aren't the sounds of thunder. They're the rumblings of the huge hail cannons on John Smith's farm.
A hailstorm can ruin a crop in minutes. So Smith installed the 6-meter-(20-foot-) tall hail cannons to stop hailstones from forming in the storm clouds over his farm.
"I think the hail cannons help, I really do," Amy Kunugi, general manager of Smith's farm, told Current Science. But scientists disagree. They have no evidence that hail cannons work and know of no reason they should. What's more, some neighbors claim that Smith's cannons are actually blasting away badly needed ...