Jill Schramm/MDN Ward County Commissioners Alan Walter, left, and John Pietsch listen to a presentation Tuesday on the cloud seeding program in District II, which includes Ward County.

Cloud seeding efforts in District II were 7% under budget during the 2019 season, according to information provided to the Ward County Commission Tuesday.

The North Dakota Cloud Modification Project spent about $48,000 less than projected in its $673,979 budget for District II, largely due to far fewer flight hours than projected for the Williston-based aircraft. District II includes Williams, McKenzie, Mountrail and Ward counties.

Darin Langerud, division director of the State Water Commission’s Atmospheric Resource Board, reviewed the program’s operations with the county commission.

Langerud said because of the weather pattern last summer, the program didn’t see operations get to normal levels until mid-July.

“A typical summer in District II, we usually fly on about half the days so that would be about 46 or 47 days out of the summer. We are a few days below that, and that was part of the reason why I think we were a little bit under the budget we had expected for flight hours,” he said.

Flights hours in District II showed 265 hours for hail suppression, 28 hours for rain enhancement and 23 hours for reconnaissance.

A meeting with county weather modification boards is scheduled for Jan. 29 at 1 p.m. in New Town. The meeting is open to the public. The 2020 program budget options will be presented.

Ward County voters will be deciding in June whether to continue to keep the county in the cloud seeding program. The county’s contract with the Atmospheric Resource Board expires in March. The county commission chose to put the matter on the ballot rather than authorize another five-year contract for cloud seeding.

The commission has trimmed the local budget for weather modification the past couple of years, reducing the county’s contribution to District II operations.

Asked about the reduction of one aircraft in Watford City and the move of a plane to service the area out of Dickinson rather than Minot, Langerud said any reduction of resources creates circumstances in which it is more difficult to address certain situations.

“For the most part, we were able to address the weather situations as they came up. But, as you know, anytime, even when we had six airplanes up here, there were some situations that would come up where you would always like to have something more available,” he said. The program had planes last year in Watford City, Williston, Stanley and Kenmare, along with two in Bowman and one in Dickinson.

Langerud said the stationing of a plane in Dickinson rather than Minot could continue in 2020. That experiment performed well in serving the needs in both Districts I and II, he said.

“Over the last 10 years or so, our ability to forecast the occurrence and location and timing of thunderstorms is increased markedly,” Langerud said. “If you look at the amount of flight hours that we’ve be flown over the last 10 or 15 years, on average that number is coming down. Part of the reason for that is we are better prepared and we have better information. We have more confidence on where things are going to happen and when than we did 15 years ago, so with that we’re not flying as much reconnaissance and we have a better idea of what type of storms will be occurring before we get there.”

However, he added there still are situations in which a meteorologist will want a pilot to do reconnaissance to better explain the cloud conditions and determine the suitability for seeding, he said.

The Atmospheric Resource Board hires meterological staff and has an intern pilot training program. The 15 seasonal employees includes three meteorologists and two meteorological interns and eight to nine pilot interns.