Showing posts with label contrails. Show all posts
Showing posts with label contrails. Show all posts

15 Sept 2017

Of Contrails and Chemtrails (with Reference to the Case of Kylie Jenner)

Kylie Jenner reflecting upon chemtrails 


I have to admit that I make very little effort to keep up with the Kardashians and their extended family network. But it's been brought to my attention that one of their number, Kylie Jenner, recently tweeted her concern about the issue of so-called chemtrails ...

"It's heartening to discover", said my correspondent, "that when not revealing her charms, this talented young model, actress, entrepreneur and media personality, is courageously attempting to expose the truth about those mysterious white lines across the sky that the authorities pretend are perfectly harmless ..."

Quite! Only not quite quite ...

Because those mysterious white lines are in fact nothing more than water vapour in the form of ice crystals and, as such, are of course entirely innocuous. In other words, chemical trails don't really exist; they are simply condensation trails (known as contrails) produced by aircraft engines burning hydrocarbons at cruise altitude, as re-imagined within the paranoid world of conspiracy theory. 

Depending on the ambient temperature and humidity, contrails may be visible for only a brief few moments, or they may persist for hours and spread to be several miles wide, coming to resemble natural cloud formations. Either way, they do not contain unknown bio-chemical agents deliberately sprayed for sinister purposes by secret government agencies.

Such claims - originating in the late 1990s - are often based on mad fantasy and shocking scientific ignorance. However, despite repeatedly being shown to be absurd, they still persist and attract followers; including, it seems, glamorous celebrities such as Miss Jenner. It's an unfortunate fact that when experts and officials deny the existence of chemtrails, believers interpret this as further evidence of a cover-up.

Lunatics, it seems, have always been prone to lifting up their eyes and looking to the heavens for signs; if not of God's greatness, then of man's inherent wickedness ...


Notes

Anyone interested in the latest research into this by a large number of atmospheric scientists might like to see an article by Christine Shearer, Mick West, Ken Caldeira and Steven J. Davis entitled 'Quantifying expert consensus against the existence of a secret, large-scale atmospheric spraying program', in Environmental Research Letters, Vol. 11, Number 8 (10 Aug 2016), IOP Publishing Ltd. Click here to read online, or here to view as a PDF.

And if anyone is interested in Kylie Jenner's tweet from 25 May 2015 on chemtrails, here it is: