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 History of Meteorology 4 (2008)  57 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Outline of Weather Proposal 
 

October 1945 
 

Vladimir K. Zworykin 
 

Radio Corporation of America 
Princeton, New Jersey, USA 

 
 
V.K. Zworykin, Outline of Weather Proposal, October 1945. Princeton, NJ: RCA Laboratories, 
1945, 12 p. + appendices, copy in the Harry Wexler Papers, Box 18, Manuscript Division, 
Library of Congress.   
 
 
Introduction1 

 
In October 1945 Vladimir K. Zworykin, Associate Research Director at the Radio 

Corporation of America (RCA) Laboratory in Princeton wrote his influential, but now all but 
forgotten mimeographed “Outline of Weather Proposal.”  He began by discussing the importance 
to meteorology of accurate prediction, which he thought was entering a new era.  Modern 
communication systems were beginning to allow the systematic compilation of scattered and 
remote observations, and new computing equipment was becoming available that could either 
solve the equations of atmospheric motion or at least search quickly for statistical regularities 
and past analogue weather conditions.  He imagined “an automatic plotting board” that would 
quickly digest and display all this information.   

Zworykin suggested that “exact scientific weather knowledge” might allow for effective 
weather control.  If a perfectly accurate machine could be developed that could predict the 
immediate future state of the atmosphere and identify the precise time and location of leverage 
points or locations sensitive to rapid storm development, then intervention might be possible.  A 
paramilitary rapid deployment force might then be deployed to intervene in the weather as it 
happens—literally to pour oil on troubled ocean waters or use physical barriers, giant flame 
throwers or even atomic bombs to disrupt storms before they formed, deflect them from 
populated areas, and otherwise control the weather.  Zworykin suggested a study of the origins 
and tracks of hurricanes, with a view to their prediction, prevention, and even diversion.  Even 
long-term climatic changes could be engineered by large-scale geographical modification 
projects involving such areas as deserts, glaciers, and mountainous regions.  In effect numerical 



 Zworykin, Outline of Weather Control  58 
 

 
 
experimentation using computer models would guide field experiments and interventions in both 
weather and climate. According to Zworykin: 

The eventual goal to be attained is the international organization of means to 
study weather phenomena as global phenomena and to channel the world’s 
weather, as far as possible, in such a way as to minimize the damage from 
catastrophic disturbances, and otherwise to benefit the world to the greatest extent 
by improved climatic conditions where possible.  Such an international 
organization may contribute to world peace by integrating the world interest in a 
common problem and turning scientific energy to peaceful pursuits.  It is 
conceivable that eventual far-reaching beneficial effects on the world economy 
may contribute to the cause of peace (original emphasis). 

 
John von Neumann formally endorsed Zworykin’s view in a letter enclosed with the 

proposal dated 24 October 1945.  Von Neumann wrote, “I agree with you completely. . . . This 
would provide a basis for scientific approach[es] to influencing the weather.”  Using computer-
generated predictions, von Neumann envisioned that weather and climate systems “could be 
controlled, or at least directed, by the release of perfectly practical amounts of energy” or by 
“altering the absorption and reflection properties of the ground or the sea or the atmosphere.”  It 
was a project that neatly fit von Neumann’s overall agenda and philosophy: “All stable processes 
we shall predict. All unstable processes we shall control.” Zworykin’s proposal also contained a 
long endorsement by the noted oceanographer Athelstan Spilhaus, then a U.S. Army major, who 
ended his letter of 6 November 1945, with these words: “In weather control, meteorology has a 
new goal worthy of its greatest efforts.” 

 
 
Note 
 

1 James R. Fleming, “Fixing the Sky: The checkered history of weather and climate 
control,” Columbia University Press, forthcoming.  
 



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