Tomorrow's Beijing Weather Forecast

Olympic officials are looking skyward in Beijing as the hours tick down to the opening of the Summer Games. The forecast for Opening Ceremonies? Stifling heat, humidity, scattered rain, and smog.

But as Portfolio.com reported, Chinese officials in the
Weather Modification Office have a plan to use rockets, peasants armed with cell phones, and airplanes to try to make Mother Nature conform to the needs of the state during this most important of events, taking place in the open-topped "bird's nest" of Olympic Stadium. But weather-changing tactics only work when rains are either far from the city or light. And tomorrow's weather is looking like it will not conform to those plans. (View an interactive feature on how China's weather-controlling approach is supposed to work.)

Current forecasts show that scattered thundershowers are a possibility all day on Friday. Not only that, Xinhua News reports that temperatures have been higher than average during the past week. Heat is one of the factors keeping Beijing's air smoggy, despite the unprecedented (and in a democracy, perhaps impossible) mandate that has kept half the cars in the Chinese capital off the road, and many factories near the Forbidden City--even as far as 90 miles away--shuttered for as long as two months prior to and during the games.

If the rains come, any displeasure the authorities voice in their tóng zhì at the Weather Modification Office may be tempered by the indubitable fact that the water and wind will help dissipate the blanket of smog currently enveloping the city.

The pomp of the Opening Ceremonies may wilt, but for the thousands of athletes who are there to go "Citius, Altius, Fortius," perhaps a good rain will give way to blue skies and cool air. And if it doesn't, rockets, peasants, and airplanes will be at the ready to make the best weather they can.

by Paul Smalera