The Fulton County news. [volume] (McConnellsburg, Pa.) 1899-current, 1900-04-26
NEW IDEA ABOUT RAIN.
PROOF THAT 1T IS CAUSED BY
ELECTRICITY.

|
The phenomena of the earth's rota-
ton, of transforms, cyclones, water
spouts, thunder and lightning are be-
ing arti6cially reproduced in the course
of some remarkable experiments at the
Elmer Gates Laboratory, at Chevy
Chase, near Washington.
Professor Gates, the famous physi-
cist who directs this,fascinating work
shop, has long been conducting elabo-
rate researches looking to the solution
| of these enigmas of nature. As a re-
suit of this labor he has deduced some
surprising theories which, in the opin-
ion of many learned men, will effect
complete revolution in present meth
ods of weather forecasting.
Many of these important discoveries
were made with the assistance of the
late H. A. Hazen, professor of meteor
ology at the United States Weather
Bureau, whose accidental death oc-
CURED n few weeks ago, just as the
work was drawing to a close.
The early experiments of the two
Investigators were made for the pur-
pose of ascertaining natures method
of ralnmaking. The most widely ac
cepted of theories hitherto offered in
explanation of this process assumes
that when moist air is carried from
one region above the earth to another
which is colder, it undergoes conden-
Bation and vice versa. Professor Gates
and Professor Hazen both doubted
that heat and moisture were the sole
fppu ~
Professor Gates had long believed that
electricity played the most important
role in weather making, and he set
about to convince his collaboration that
he.was correct.
In the initial experiment large
fluffy mass of fleece cotton was sus-
pended from the ceiling of the labora-
tory by dry silk thread, and was
electrically charged by one pole of n
powerful static machine. The other
pole was connected with similar
mass of cotton.
As the two tufts were being charged |
they grew perceptibly larger. Brought
nearer, they grew smaller. When |
sufficiently near or sufficiently charged |
for spark to pass between them, as
a lightning flash passes between two
clouds, they twitched at the moment |
OF discharge.
The two tufts were afterward filled |
with smoke puti'ed into them through |
tube. Some of this smoke was
elected by each at the moment a spark |
passed. When certain distance |
apart, the smoke left one of the masses
and proceeded in straight line to the
other. Thus the electricity actually |
carried the yapor from one to the
other.
Then steam was injected into one
tult and some of its moisture was
similarly conveyed to the interior of |
the other, as proved by an instrument
for measuring humidity. 1t was
noticed that although one piece of
cotton would increase in volume |
when first charged with electricity, it |
would begin to shrink as soon as it |
indlced an opposite charge in some
adjacent mass of matter.
A volume of moisture-saturate air
was next enclosed in rubber toy |
balloon suspended by string. The |
balloon swelled when highly charged, |
but shrunk when in the presence of a
body charged with opposite electricity.
When a succession of sparks passed |
into the balloon it appeared to take a
sudden expiration, then an inspira-
tion Immediately afterward.
These and other experiments proved |
to the satisfaction of the two investi-
gators that electrical conditions are
capable of increasing and diminishing
the density of the air.
In later experiment moist cur
rent of air was charged with negative
electricity as it entered the laboratory |
through an open window. A similar
current from another source was
charged with positive electricity. At |
distance between the two inlets and |
where the two currents mingled u
mist was seen to form. 1t was this
successful attempt at rainmalling in
doors which is believed to have solved |
the problem as to how Dame Nature
herself aggregates the moisture of the
air into mists, rain or snow.
According to Professor Gates, if one
locality or cloud acquire a charge of
electricity, some adjacent locality or
cloud must acquire a charge of oppo-
site electricity. Midway between these
two oppositely charged clouds or
regions of moist air there must be one
or more secondary regions where their
respective particles commingle. Those
of one being positive and those of the
other being negative they attract,
cohere and form raindrops. One |
region may be n cloud or a vapor-
charged air mass, and the other may
he another cloud or the earth. When
disturbances of thel electric equilib-
rum of ithe atmosphere occur differ
ences in density, pressure, tempera-
ture and moisture result.
Returning to the cotton tufts, it was
discovered that when one was charged !
with positive, the other with negative
electricity, and the former only was
saturated with smoke, injected into
its centre, the smoke escaped toward
the opposite tuft and assumed conf
cal clord.like shape, its particles tray
cling across the intervening space in
the form of a waterspout. This was
repeated many times.
BY connecting one terminal of his
static machine with the bottom of a
saucer of water, pierced by wire,