[ExI] how to tame hurricanes

[spike]

On 2013-12-15 18:32, John Clark wrote:
> Storms get their energy from the warm water on the ocean's surface, so 
> if you could cool that surface layer you could reduce the power of a 
> hurricane, one interesting idea for doing this is called a "Salter Sink".


Cool idea!  It has my wheels spinning, mostly on variations on a theme.  I
am thinking about a tube of some sort, which floats vertically with the top
end about a meter above the surface, diameter about 2 meters, length of
about 20 meters, set up in such a way that it bobs in the water.  At the top
end periphery, you create hinged doors which allows water to pour in when
submerged but prevents it from flowing back out.  

Each wave that hits the tube circulates cooler water down only 20 meters
below, which is about 5 to 10 C cooler.  You make jillions of these things
that can be deployed rapidly: you stack them on the deck of a repurposed
aircraft carrier (or any other retired warship for that matter, we don't
need them anymore), then roll them off the deck into the water in the
predicted path of a hurricane.  The outside would be just a straight 20
meter long tube made of anything, polystyrene for instance, something that
can flex a little.  Floatation devices inside the tube on one end, ballast
if necessary at the other.  With the dimensions given, they could come in at
4 tons each, so a carrier could easily haul a few thousand of them.

John this idea is worth doing some single-digit numbers.  Well done, me lad!

spike