Weekday Pollution Linked to Pattern of Rainy Weekends on East Coast

Pollution, not Mother Nature, is to blame for wet weekends and sunny Mondays along the East Coast, climatologists said Wednesday. They discovered that the daily accumulation of carbon monoxide and ozone over the Eastern Seaboard is affecting regional weather, and even hurricanes’ strength, as much as El Nino.

Reporting in the journal Nature, Randall Cerveny and Robert Balling Jr. of Arizona State University said they found proof that weather patterns in the region follow a seven-day cycle. Instead of the wrath of Mother Nature, the predictable weekend rain is most likely due to a natural cloud-seeding effect created by the drift of East Coast pollution created during the week. They also found that the build-up of carbon monoxide and ozone apparently reduces the intensity of hurricanes during the weekend.

Compiled by Times medical writer Thomas H. Maugh II