Rainmaking

[1] According to the clouds' different physical properties, this can be done using airplanes or rockets to sow to the clouds with catalysts such as dry ice, silver iodide and salt powder, to make clouds rain or increase precipitation, to remove or mitigate farmland drought, to increase reservoir irrigation water or water supply capacity, to increase water levels for hydropower generation, or even to solve the global warming problem.

It was practiced on the American frontier, but may have reached a peak during the Dust Bowl drought of the US west and midwest in the 1930s.

[citation needed] In some Christian areas, clerics of the Eastern Orthodox Church are believed to possess the power to arrest rain, bring hail to the farms of wayward souls, as well as to bring rain when the rainy season falls short.

It is also used to describe a confidence trick where the scammer takes money from the victim to influence a system over which they have no real control, but a random chance of the outcome happening anyway.

These rituals differ greatly in their specifics, but share a common concern with bringing rain through spiritual means.

Typical of these ceremonies was the public prayer service for rain by then-governor of Georgia, Sonny Perdue, in 2007.