Iran Sprays Chemicals to Seed Clouds Over Dried Lake Urmia Amid Historic Drought

Iran has resumed cloud-seeding flights over the heavily shrunken Lake Urmia basin in the northwest as an emergency response to a historic drought.

“South Africa has been a vocal critic of Israel and has taken the matter to the International Court of Justice”

Arab News

Authorities reported an initial flight and promised further operations across East and West Azerbaijan provinces.

Arab News

Officials and state media say aircraft, and in some reports drones, will disperse seeding agents to try to induce rain and boost runoff into catchment basins near the lake.

The operation is presented as a technical effort to stimulate precipitation amid dramatic surface water loss at Urmia.

Lake Urmia has largely dried into a salt plain after prolonged aridity.

The campaign comes amid an extreme nationwide rainfall shortfall.

Multiple outlets report autumn precipitation was roughly 89% below long-term averages, calling it the driest autumn in about 50 years.

BBC

Tehran recorded its lowest rainfall in roughly a century.

Reservoirs and major dams are at historic lows and near empty.

Authorities warn some cities could face imminent water shortages.

The situation has prompted emergency conservation measures and sharp cuts to water use.

Officials describe cloud-seeding as an established weather-modification tool.

“Water levels in Tehran's Amirkabir dam are at 8% of capacity, officials say Authorities in Iran have sprayed clouds with chemicals to induce rain, in an attempt to combat the country's worst drought in decades”

BBC

They say aircraft will disperse particles such as silver iodide or salt into clouds, and some reports also mention ground generators.

Iranian authorities say they have domestic cloud-seeding technology and plan ongoing operations.

Media note the seeding aims to increase runoff into catchment basins to marginally raise water availability rather than restore the lake in the short term.

Iranian leaders have warned of severe societal impacts if rains do not arrive.

President Masoud Pezeshkian and other officials have publicly raised the prospect of water rationing, emergency measures and even evacuation scenarios for Tehran.

CNN

Authorities are already imposing strict water-use cuts in affected areas.

Media reports link these warnings to the prospect that, without precipitation, major population centers could face acute shortages of drinking water and services.

Coverage diverges when it comes to geopolitics, historical context and culpability.

“Iran has begun cloud seeding flights to induce rain amid its worst drought in decades, starting in the critically dry Urmia Lake basin and planning further operations in East and West Azerbaijan”

Daily Times

Some outlets place the cloud-seeding plainly in the context of climate change and domestic emergency response.

Daily Times

Others note regional cloud-seeding activity and prior Iranian accusations that countries such as Israel and the UAE attempted to divert or block rain.

Regional media reported that claim, but international outlets presented it as an allegation rather than a verified fact.