As part of the yearly effort to create rain in Thailand's driest regions, the Agriculture and Cooperatives Ministry (ACM) have called upon the help of two Alpha jets.

Royal Thai Air Force chief Itthaporn Subhawong said that air force had given the jets to His Majesty the King in September last year, and this year will be the first time they will support the rainmaking operations. 

 The two German-made Alpha jet-fighters are equipped with cold cloud-making instruments and fly at an altitude of 20,000 while releasing silver iodide bullets that help create rain.

ACM Itthaporn said the air force had also developed hygroscopic flare dispensers to make rain from warm clouds. These instruments have been deployed on its AU-23 Peacemaker aircraft.

Last year, the air force completed 618 flights which totaled 770 hours of rainmaking and used nearly 900 tonnes of chemicals. The operations have always been a great success, the average rainmaking success rate ranges from 85% to 95%.

The air force has deployed around 400 crew and 15 aircraft in the operation: four BT-67 and three NOMAD transport planes, six AU-23 fighter planes and the two Alpha Jets from Wing 23 in Udon Thani.

The rainmaking operations started in Ubon Ratchathani on the 10th of this month, and will continue at other stations located in Lop Buri, Ubon Ratchathani, Surat Thai and Chiang Mai . Water trucks have been sent to help locals and crews that have been assigned to forest fires. Authorities in Tak, have also opened their rain-making center to try to ease the impact of the drought in nine districts.

The rainmaking technique was discovered by His Majesty the King in 1999. Since then, the greatly revered King Bhumibol has devoted a large amount of time to studying and developing new techniques of artificial rainmaking. In 2002, he patented a unique cloud-seeding technique which effectively saved the country millions of dollars in damage.