Reply #23: I can only tell you what I do know. I lived in Roswell, NM in the late

[karlrschneider]

1940s when Walker AFB there was active. They flew B-36 planes, long before there were any commercial passenger jets. They flew high enough to make a lot of contrails around there (they were called 'vapor trails' back then.) That's when I became interested in aviation and weather.

Some of them would be gone in minutes and some would hang around for hours. It all depends on the
upper level winds. The fact is, there are Ten times more high altitude flights right now than there
were even a decade ago. I don't want to get into what they may be doing to the upper atmosphere right now, that's a different discussion but just want to explain that in my opinion which I think has some
credibility as I'm a commercial pilot since 1963 and a graduate aeronautical engineer almost that long.

I didn't fly today, and I was out in the yard picking up broken tree limbs from the ice storm from a couple weeks ago and as usual was occasionally peering up at the sky. I also had my aviation radio turned on, listening to the comings and goings of the airplanes in and out of Tulsa, 30 miles away and
those passing through the area at high altitude also.

It's just something I do...hear them talking to air traffic control and being able to see them
'in the flesh', as it were. There were several contrails which I was able to directly identify
since I knew exactly which aircraft was overhead. I'd say 4 out of 10 were private planes (like I
fly) - Lear jet types (many people think there are only 3 kinds of airplanes: Piper Cubs, Lear jets
and 747s) ;-)

I really think there's a simple explanation for your observation. When the contrails disappear
quickly, you don't really 'think about' them...since they're so ephemeral (the upper wind blows them away) but when there isn't much wind up there, they just 'hang around' and so you tend to notice them.

The upper air currents around here were very weak today and there were several lingering contrails,
which as I mentioned, I mostly knew from where they came. :D

Anyway, I seriously doubt there's some secret cabal putting weird chemicals into my fuel tanks.
I'm pretty sure the engines would protest. We buy jet fuel from different sources every few days
depending on where we are. I also know the military gets theirs from the same refineries that our
suppliers do...if they're adding some funny stuff to it after they put it in the planes I would be
extremely surprised. I just don't buy this chemtrail stuff. Hope this helps.
ks