Are contrails actually chemtrails?

You know those trails that jets leave in the sky? While science has explained why they happen, plenty of conspiracy theorists believe there's more to it. Join Josh and Chuck as they channel the guys from Stuff They Don't Want You to Know in this episode.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff you should know
from house Stuff Works dot com. Hey, welcome to the podcast.
I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles, Chuck Bryant and us. We

(00:20):
were together and there's a couple of microphones in front
of us. This is stuff, as you know, all that
separates us to some cheap bone yeah, and metal in
the table and some clean X and Y and this
I keel lamp from the lamp. So there's actually a
lot between us. It's come to think of it, this
box of chalk. Yeah, what's that here for? I don't know.

(00:44):
There's some really uninteresting things on this table, the playroom
in here. Well, we screwed this one up already. Great, Um,
nowhere to go but up. That's a great way to
look at this, Chuck. Yeah, that's great. I'm not going
to use it as a segway, but it's a really
good positive way of looking at things. Okay you, um, Chuck,
what do what does the cities of Boston, Massachusetts, Calgary, Canada?

(01:10):
Boot where is it in Canada? Edmonton? Okay? Edmonton? Uh?
And a little town called Palmer, Alaska have to do
with one another. I love when you do this. Um,
I have no idea. Actually, I mean they're all cities
or towns in the northern hemisphere North America. Are you

(01:35):
ready for the answer which destroys your guests? All three
cities recently voted to remove or stop adding Florida to
their water supply. Okay, do you know that? I did not,
But we've covered that before. We have. We we got
a little um overboard, possibly in our disdain for floride,

(01:56):
did we Maybe? Who knows. I thought it was a
good one. I still will stand by most of it
because we're in our younger days. Yeah, are headier days.
But um, so there's three towns that are starting to
wake up because the well that it's not it's not
really a conspiracy theory as much. It's more, um, apparently
people are buying their fluoride. Cities are buying their fluoride

(02:19):
from China, and the Chinese fluoride is subpar and it's
starting to like gom up the city water works. So
they're like, we either need to find a good supplier
or else we need to stop adding flooride. And everybody said,
you know what, let's stop adding fluoride. There's not even
real evidence that it works to prove a tooth decay. Okay,

(02:39):
so I'm with you. That's one major government conspiracy down dead,
onto the next one. Right, we're gonna talk about camp trails. Yeah,
we handle these occasionally. We have a video podcast. It's
not our own, but our our fellows uh college here,

(03:00):
uh stuff. They don't want you to know, right, they
tackle these conspiracy things and it's a lot of fun.
Matt and Ben, they know what they're doing. We try
to avoid it because a lot of times I just
don't want to be the guy that poopoo's everything and
or the guy that is the conspiracy dude. But we're
gonna tackle it today because people have asked for kim
trails over and over. Yeah. Yeah, so, um, we're gonna

(03:22):
talk about it and we're gonna handle it very well.
Let's let's talk about this, so just to get everybody
on the same page, a chem trail, depending on who
you are, who you're talking to, um, is either a
chem trail or a contrail. And let's talk about contrails first.
That's what the f a A would call it. You
know those streaks in the sky that follow a plane.

(03:42):
Lovely ones outside my window today. That's great. They're essentially
man made serious clouds, right. Yeah. What happens is when
you are in a jet plane, your jet engine produced
is very very hot. Um air is exhaust sure um.
Also included in that very very hot air is water vapor.

(04:04):
And if you are flying in an airplane very high
up say thirty thou feet, the ambient temperature, atmospheric temperature
is going to be about negative forty degrees, which is
the same it's Celsie sanfair well remember celsie height. Yes, um.
So when you have uh, there's also lower lower atmospheric pressure.

(04:27):
And if you also have thrown in there saturated air,
humid air, very humid, the vapor pressure, which is the
pressure that gas exerts on its surrounding environment. When you
have that all combined, you have what amounts to a
man made cloud. A contrail. Yeah, condensation. Condensation, that's an

(04:48):
even better way to put it. It's it's water droplets
or a lot of times, but not always, as our
author says, it turns into ice. It doesn't always turn
into ice. Sometimes it's just water, but a lot of
times it will crystallize into ice if it's cold enough.
And that's what you're seeing contrails, condensation trails shortened to contrails. Um,

(05:12):
So problem solved. They dissipate. Yeah, eventually it depends if you, um,
if you're in drier areas, Um, it's going to dissipate
more quickly. As Jay McGrath, who wrote this article points out, Um,
if you've ever been out on like a very cold
day and it was very humid and cold, your you
can see your breath far longer. It takes far longer

(05:35):
to dissipate then, Um, it does on a cold, dry day.
That's right. That's because the air is less saturated and
hence the vapor pressure is um higher on a dry day.
That's right. And in this exhaust or contrail, if you will,
you're gonna find carbon dioxide, nitrous oxides, shot sulfate, and uh.

(06:00):
Most scientists agree, if not all, I haven't talked to
all of them yet, still got like three three people
to go. Uh, they agreed that this extra cloud cover
essentially can be bad for the environment. Yeah, there was
a that's not debated very much right now. No, there's
a study that was released that basically estimates that um

(06:23):
it just in one year, the energy trapped by contrails
um is about was about a third of all of
the energy trapped in the history of aviation um from
greenhouse gas emissions of planes. So like, these contrails are
like apparently a really big problem as far as climate
change goes in creating the greenhouse effect. Well, there's a

(06:46):
lot more UH flights going on now than ever before,
a lot more than there were twenty and thirty and
forty years ago, obviously, Yes, so yeah, it's an issue.
So that's what a contrail is, and they are ventially problematic.
UM that mystery should be lying there dead. I mean,
they're just not really a mystery. It's like you can

(07:07):
explain it through science. Apparently the f A, A, NASA,
other aviation agencies, Northrop Grumman probably UM has said, here
is exactly what's going on. And whenever you lay something
out and you do it in a very forthright UM way,

(07:29):
a lot of times conspiracy theorists think you're lying, you're
making something up. Sure, so a lot of conspiracy theories
have cropped up, and basically most conspiracy theorists say, yes,
I understand there's such thing as contrails. Stop trying to
humiliate me. But have you noticed that contrails stick around

(07:53):
way longer than they used to? That is, uh, we'll
do a little before after with this, they say. They
say that kim trails is let's go ahead and just
let the cat out of the bag. They're calling these
kim trails, and they're saying they're there doping the fuel,
essentially lacing it with chemicals. Myrriad reasons that will go

(08:16):
over here in a second, and these chemicals make it
stick around longer, that's what they say. It's it's telltale
evidence that there are chemicals, as you say, they're the
planes exhausts are being doped with this stuff. Uh gosh,
I wish I had this guy's name. M A atmospheric
scientists that I've looked up earlier said this is one

(08:37):
of the biggest claims that kim trailers, as he calls it,
gets wrong. He says, Uh, contrails can persist for hours
as well. They've done so since we've had jet planes. Um,
if you look at old photographs from the sixties and seventies,
you're gonna see contrails in the sky just like we
see today there are a lot more of them now

(08:59):
because there's a lot our flights. And he said, uh
quote often when persistent contrails exist from feet, several long
contrails uh increase in number and gradually will merge into
an almost interlaced solid sheet. And he said, this happens,
it's a contrail, and that can happen with a contrail

(09:22):
and go ahead. A Kim Trailers would say, that's a sheet,
purposeful sheet of chemicals being laced over the world in
the atmosphere. And we all know why forty feet is
the limit that that scientists cited. Yeah, we went over
that to me. Yeah. Um, so here's I guess the

(09:43):
crux of the of the problem. There's there is this
thing that everybody agrees is there. We're all looking at
it as it's there, But why is it there? And um,
it's very tough to explain to a conspiracy theorist that
what they believe is incorrect, especially when you can't take
them and show them, you know, the plane that nobody's
doping it. Yeah. Another guy I read said, you know,

(10:05):
when we try to explain this to them, they say,
you're just part of the conspiracy, which I mean kind
of shuts down any intelligent conversation about it right there,
but it opens up some fantastic speculation. So UM, if
people if the government, usually it is the government that's
tasked with UM or that's accused of doping plane exhausted UM.

(10:29):
If the government we're doing that's why why would they
possibly be doing this? And there's here's where we get
to like the myriad reasons this is great. Yeah, they range,
I mean there's a lot of reasons, but they range
from UH, population control, essentially killing the sick and the
elderly quicker with these mysterious flues. Right, and this this

(10:51):
coincides with belief in the New World Order UM, where
basically there there is a movement it's an alleged movement
toward UM controlling the population more UM. Basically it's eugenics
on a global scale. But apparently China is being left out.
I went on this one chem trail UM conspiracy theorist

(11:15):
I guess a chem trailer website, and the author was saying, like,
there's no such you never see a chem trailer in
China because the in w O is like grooming China
to be like the premier country. So and just like
this one sentence or two, this guy really laid a
lot of stuff on the table. You have, like the nWo,

(11:38):
the rise of China, and chem trails all in like
one sentence. Was the Illuminati in there anywhere? I didn't
search for it, but it's possible. Well that's one reason, okay,
so population control, they're killing people off. Another reason is
that we are experimenting with weather control for defense purposes.
But this is we have done before. England has done this.

(12:01):
We talked about cloud seating and it was Operation Cumulus.
I can't remember which one we talked about it, and
it was it was early Yeah, anyway, Yeah, we'll just
go over it again. Operation Cumulus. It was a cloud
seating operation by the Royal Air Force in the fifties
UM where they were experimenting with making it rain so

(12:21):
that they could you know, flood enemy forces whatever. If
you can control the weather, there's all sorts of great
things you can do with it. And it actually worked
and it worked way way too well. And as we
talked about, like a lot of people died from flash
floods and whole villages were just washed away, and the
Royal Air Force went back home, and then the Ministry

(12:45):
Defense denied it until two thousand one, So it's possible.
China does it. China did it before the Olympics. Uh yeah,
with silver Eye died. Yeah did it work there? Yeah?
You just shoot silver eyed died or dry I saw
or something, and it creates um the conditions needed to
make it rain, for a cloud to become pregnant with rain,

(13:09):
and then that it goes away. I love that term
pregnant with rain or pregnant with anything that's not a baby.
You know what I'm saying. Okay, Uh. Others will say
that it is uh aluminum being shot into the air
to reflect the the harmful rays of the sun to

(13:32):
combat global warming, which would be a good use quote unquote,
I guess um. And there is such a thing as chaff.
You know what chaff is c H A F F.
Chaff is released from the underbelly of a plane. And
that is in fact, little aluminum needles um released into
the air. But it's used. It's been used since World

(13:53):
War Two by US in the Germans and anyone with
any kind of advanced defense program military program, am too
confuse uh enemy radar, Like hey, look, this is an
actual object up here that you're going to fire your
missile at, So don't fire at me. So there's such
a thing's chaff, but it's not released through the exhaust.

(14:14):
It's dumped out like your spraying crops. Huh. Well. Plus, also,
if we're using that for defense purposes anti missile defense,
why would a commercial air aircraft be launching it? I
guess dropping chaff, as they say in the biziness. Yeah,
so you know that's what chaff is, and that's a
real thing. Contrails are real things. So this all kind

(14:37):
of gets mixed together though in a in a conspiracy
like manner. Um, And you were saying like that, there's
an idea that the government is well intentionedly um trying
to combat global warming. I have a feeling that like
this would be well publicized. Yeah they would tell that.

(15:00):
I would think, so, like, hey, well yeah, but I
think the conspiracy theorist said, then then they would have
to admit all the dangers of global warming. Um touche.
You know, there's there's a rebuttal for for everything. It's
a great game of ping pong. There is another one
that I came across too, that is my personal favorite.

(15:21):
Another reason. Let's hear um that the government probably the
larger New World Order. Somebody is um manipulating organ. Okay, Oregon.
Are you familiar with Kate Bush's song cloud Busting? No?
Oh you're not. No. I like Kate Bush though. It's great.
It's like her most famous song and like I feel

(15:43):
like a healed No don't. Her video for it star
Donald Pleasants as the dad. It was directed by Terry
Gilliam And you can tell man, it's cool. Yeah, just
just look up the video for cloud Busting a YouTube.
Good song even, but it's a ballad. It's about this
guy named will how Mich who um was an Austrian
psychoanalyst who moved to the US and the fifties, and

(16:05):
he claimed to have discovered this stuff called organ, which
is a life energy that everything has basically like q
um right yeah um, And there's a packet of organ
that surrounds the earth and protects it and gives it life. Okay.

(16:29):
So he apparently fell him really really badly with the
f d A. They considered him like a huckster and
a fraud because he was he was selling organ generators
that would basically or organ accumulators that would you know,
heal cancer grow like plants or whatever, and he did
to your bit in jail. And I looked this up

(16:52):
and I'm pretty sure it's accurate. The f d A
banned and destroyed his books. Really, I didn't know that
I can do that. So it looked even further, and
it turns out the FDA destroyed, banned, and destroyed another
book on cooking with Stevia. I'm not kidding. I looked
and found it in several places that this really happened

(17:13):
to this guy in Texas who wrote a natural food cookbook. UM.
So apparently the FDA can burn your books if they
want to. But anyway, Wilhelm Reich was jailed, UM, and
he died in prison in nine seven. UM. But the
I've came across this chem trail theorist idea that um,

(17:33):
chem trails changed the polarity of the organ that surrounds
the earth and affects us. So you can make You
can make your own cloud busting machine at home for
about five bucks from parts you can get at home depot. Yeah.
Pretty cool. Yeah. If you go to educate en yourself

(17:55):
dot org, you can find a chem buster schematics. I'll
do it. I got five bucks to burn and look
up the look up that Kate Bush song the video
loan is really cool. Yeah, it sounds like it when
they put some real money into music videos back in
the day. What else, Josh got any other reasons? Well,

(18:17):
then let's talk a little bit about Uh. Well, the
United States actually did address this, because a lot of
times they'll just not even give any credence to these
conspiracy theories. But there were there were so many inquiries
to this. The NASA, E P A and f A
A and in O a A issued a joint back

(18:38):
sheet and two thousand that explained everything and said, you know,
here's the deal, here's your back sheet. This is official,
and this is our official stance. I think the Air
Force did something similar. Didn't do anything to dissuade anyone. No,
and I'm sure and it catch twenty two. The fact
that they did uncharacteristically break the silence and come forward

(19:00):
just added fuel to the fire. Yeah, or strengthen the
conviction of conspiracy theorists. When didn't you say? I think so.
One of the things that the conspiracy theorists will point
to with Kim Trail or let's just keep calling them
kim trailers, so much easier. UH. They will point to
the grid like patterns as mysterious as as setting it

(19:23):
up so it will eventually form a complete coverage, you know,
from day to day, and UH air traffic dudes will say,
you know what, that's because of the our aerospace, our
airspace systems, North south and east west flight lanes. That's
how we send planes. So they're gonna criss cross like

(19:43):
that and it's gonna look like a grid. Seems to
explain things away pretty well. There was also josh A
the news you know, local news, like they'll get on
the case of something like this and get really excited,
especially when weatherman and are involved, because they'll get like,
all of a sudden they get to do one of
those investigative reports that they never get to do. So
in Shreveport, Louisiana at k s l A News twelve,

(20:07):
they did a test because this UH guy said, you
know what, I've noticed these unusual clouds that that just
continue to fall until they reached the ground, and I'm
collecting this water and we should examine, you know, testas water.
So they was like, sure, of course we should and
they tested it and found uh high levels of barrier

(20:28):
at six point eight parts per million, which is more
than three times a toxic level, and they said, we're
onto something here because that is a hallmark of uh
KIM trail testing. And then they found out they actually
misread the report and it was six point um sorry,
sixty eight parts per billion. Oh, not six point eight

(20:50):
per million, but sixty eight pervillion, and it was well
within the range. They retracted their story. Other local stations
around the country picked up on that and then kind
of had to watch the offer their face afterwards, or
they just never mentioned it again without a follow up exactly.
UH colors A lot of times these things will have

(21:10):
vibrant colors. And UH I saw a show on our
own Discovery channel called Best Evidence, and one of their
atmospheric researchers said, that's just it's coloration. You're gonna get it.
And you're on the ground, you can't tell, like getting
back to the grid, you can't tell from the ground
what atmosphere these things are at. So it looks like

(21:31):
a criss cross right over each other might bet apart.
And you're looking at this from the ground, you're looking
at the colors like is a rainbow some vaste conspiracy
as well. Somebody's got a conspiracy theory on that one,
the rainbow. I think Kim Trails proved that there's a
conspiracy theory on absolutely everything. Uh, that's true. Um, but

(21:53):
this show, it was actually pretty good. It was called
best Evidence. You can watch it on the YouTube's or
maybe Discovery dot com is it, I don't know. And
they actually tested stuff. They tested jet emissions in a
lab for aluminum and UH tested them with atomic absorption spectrometers,
and they also tested it in the air um with

(22:15):
a land spectrometer and they found no aluminum in in
the fuel or exhaust. However, the conspiracy theorists will say, well,
you didn't get the doped fuel. You just tested regular
jet fuel and not the secret jet fuel that the
US government. And it's not just US, Canada and and
and Britain and other countries UH have made these claims

(22:37):
as well. So it's semi worldwide, but not in China evidently,
because there's so such thing as a contrailer a Kim
trail in China. They're the NWOS favorite. And then the
dentist cscentach thing. Yeah tell me about this. I haven't
heard he And this is something that the KIM trailers

(22:57):
will point to in the UH that there was a
bill introduced by Dennis Casinich, a dude I happened to like,
and uh, the Space Preservation Act HR two seven, and
it actually specifically banned KIM trails. And they said, see
they use the word kim trails is the government act.

(23:18):
It turns out it was not a bill that he
had written. It was written by UFO enthusiasts. And some
of the other things included in there that they wanted
banned were, uh, plasma weapons, psychotronic weapons, extra terrestrial weapons,
and climate weapons. Psychotronic weapons are real? Are they? I
believe so? Like remember the guy who went to Waco

(23:40):
and like was saying he could like play this jumbled
sound and it would drive everybody out of the house.
And FBI said, well, what happens if it doesn't work?
And he said, they'll probably just slid each other's throats weapons. No,
but it's what he had. The technology he created was real. Okay.
Apparently the story behind this is Cassina didn't read the

(24:01):
bill fully before he endorsed it, and then afterward he
read it and said, uh, jeez, here we go. He
rewrote it. Uh, and then the bill died then dropped
in two thousand two, even after it was rewritten to
omit all of the uh plasma weapons. Yeah, the gobbledy
cook that's crazy. Wow. I think that's a great piece

(24:24):
of history. Well, yeah, I do remember we talked about
how contrails, whether their contrails, chemtrails, whatever, they seem to
have um a very pronounced effect. You came across something,
um at September eleven two one climate study. Yeah, that
was I remember. They did study something because it's a
really rare thing to not have any planes for a

(24:44):
few days. Exactly, for three days, all air traffic in
the United States was grounded. Yeah, and there was for
for the first time since the history of the invention
of the plane. Yeah, that's what I mean by exactly
three straight days where there were no planes in this guy.
So UM, a couple of people scrambled to um study
any effects that happened, and uh they found that there

(25:08):
they there was a diurnal temperature change, right. Um, well,
it's the temperature difference between day and night and a
single day. Um. They they observed at one point eight
degree change from the other days the other three days
sorry um, from the three days leading up to the

(25:29):
eleventh and the three days following the fourteen. So that's
pretty substantial in thirty years they had ever recorded, so
that the contrails are real and they do have an effect.
We just need to get rid of air travel. My
deal when it comes and I said I wasn't gonna

(25:50):
do this in here I go. My deal when it
comes to any like conspiracy that's this vast and widespread
where the airline industry is in on it, and the
dudes on the ground and that work for Delta are
you know and on this it's just it's so has
to be so vast that uh, there would be some
kind of proof and there's no evidence that I never

(26:14):
have not found any single person that's ever come out
and say, you know what, I was a part of
this program. Now I can't remember what that's called. Where
like the absence of evidence is evidence itself, But yeah,
in this case, I would say that that's pretty strong.
And one of the other things that Kim trailers will
say is or or people that don't believe it will say, is, well,

(26:35):
why are they doing this out in full view, like
where everyone can see it, and they go exactly, of
course they're going to do it in front of pull
of you because any won't suspect anything. Well, the irony
is that, um, there are chemicals that can be added
to the jets exhaust, but not to create chem trails,

(26:58):
but to keep contrails from forming. Really, yeah, the original
stealth bomber um had this extra option to make it stealth. Yes,
that makes sense. They figured out, No, you can just
fly at a different altitude, stay away from wet areas,
and our pilots know what they're doing, so they don't
even use it or they didn't use it. But there's

(27:19):
your irony right there for the episode. Well, and then
the one of the guys on the Discovery show said,
you can't add aluminum to jet fuel, like the plane
wouldn't run, Like it wouldn't be able to handle that.
Why are why are these fish not running my outboard motor? Right?
And finally for me at least, Uh, the Rise and

(27:40):
the Kim Trail conspiracy, although it had been around for
a little while, really gained steam they say in two thousand,
sort of coinciding with the massive pickup of of Internet,
and not just that this stuff change to the millennium.
I think everybody was really paranoid in like the decade
leading up to that. I think about one of the

(28:01):
number one shows of that decade, X Files. I love
that show. This lady on the on the Best Evident
show sent all these pictures of different Kim trails to
one of the atmospheric researchers and she said, to see here,
how this has become a sudden burst of a cloud.
And this one's uh, it had come from this Kim

(28:22):
trail and now it's a burst of a cloud. And
he went, now that's a cloud, and that's a Kim
trail that it intersects it or doesn't. Maybe it's off byet,
but it's like, that's just a cloud, and this is
this and this is that. And he explained every single picture.
He's like, think, weird things happen. He depending on how
high you are and how human it is, and how

(28:43):
the engine of the plane is running. He said, they're
gonna look different, and it's just easily explained. Chuck, Josh,
you should be very proud of yourself because you helped
take a two page, six hundred seven word article and
turn it into a thirty minute plus podcast. Much chaff,

(29:05):
So there you go without much silver needles. Hey you
were you were half of that. I was less than that.
You did good. So that's cam trails. If you want
to read this article, you can type in cam trails
C H E M T R A I L S
if you've got three and a half minutes to burn
right in the search bar. How stuff works dot com

(29:26):
And I said search bar. So it's time for listener mail, Josh,
I'm gonna call this. Uh, I've got my poop card.
I'm not afraid to use it. Oh, this is a
good one. You remember this is from Tina. Hi. Guys
just listened to how the digestive system works and loved it.
I've been waiting to have a cool reason to write
in once again one of those, but never felt like

(29:49):
I had any kind of expertise until you mentioned Crohn's disease.
I was diagnosed in two thousand eight had surgery to
remove a section of my small intestine. I had never
heard of the disease until the doc told me he
had removed fourteen centimeters of my intestine that have been
severely affected by it. I was glad you mentioned what
we're going through, and I can answer a question he raised.
I'm a member of the crones and Colitis Foundation of

(30:12):
America and they did send me a card that says
I can't wait and it's an all caps to which
I guess it is on the card and it explains
on the card that have a medical condition that requires
immediate need of the restroom. I keep it my wallet
and it's coming handy for all those emergencies. My boyfriend
thinks it's hilarious. I do too, actually, but it makes

(30:33):
me feel better having it around just in case. I'd
love to hear you read a part of this on
the podcast done. It would make me and my poor
crones infested shortened intestines so happy. And yes, I am
playing the sympathy card. And then it's Tina, I can't
wait card and asleep at the card. So there's a card.

(30:55):
Yeah it took you, Uh you did a portion? Was
that fourteen centimeters of her? You know? Is it proportion?
That's what she said. Yeah, what she asked, if we'd
read a portion of it got you? It wasn't that good? Like, um, okay, well,
if you have had a significant part of your body removed.
We'd like to hear about it. Um, you can tweet

(31:17):
it to us. If the part is a hundred and
forty characters are less, that's s Y s K podcast.
One word. That's our Twitter handle. You can join us
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