Fact Check: Why Is Everyone Blaming Cloud Seeding for the Texas Flood?
Many are blaming weather modification techniques for the tragic flooding that took the lives of more than 100 people.
Published July 9 2025, 9:52 a.m. ET
An unimaginable tragedy played out in central Texas over the Fourth of July holiday in 2025, when record-breaking rains fell in the region. The rapid downpour caused the Guadalupe River to quickly overflow, rising 26 feet in under an hour, according to most accounts.
That intense and overwhelming stream of water then rushed through several campsites in the area, washing away cars, RVs, and cabins, many with campers still inside of them.
The death toll quickly climbed into the triple digits in the days that followed, which included the deaths of dozens of children. In an effort to make sense of everything that happened, some people came up with fringe theories about how cloud seeding could've been to blame. The misinformation quickly spread online, lending confusion to the horrific events of the holiday weekend.
Keep reading to see the cloud seeding theory from the Texas floods explained.
Why are people sharing a cloud seeding theory related to the Texas flood?
Shortly after the scope of the devastation of the flooding from central Texas was revealed, conspiracy theories started popping up on social media, claiming that weather modification was responsible for the epic amounts of water that breached the banks of the Guadalupe River.
Among the most popular were the ones that claimed that technology known as cloud seeding was responsible for the storm.
The conspiracy theory was spread far and wide, and far-right Senator Marjorie Taylor Greene even said she would introduce a bill to make these types of weather modification practices illegal, tweeting about it on the app formerly known as Twitter on July 5, 2025.
"I am introducing a bill that prohibits the injection, release, or dispersion of chemicals or substances into the atmosphere for the express purpose of altering weather, temperature, climate, or sunlight intensity. It will be a felony offense," she wrote on X.
She claimed that it would be similar to Florida’s Senate Bill 56, which Governor Ron DeSantis approved on June 20, 2025.
For those unfamiliar with the practice, cloud seeding involves injecting a chemical into an existing cloud — according to Wikipedia, popular options include potassium iodide, dry ice, or silver iodide — to help produce the moisture needed to generate rain or snow. The delivery method can vary, and companies that practice cloud seeding can use things like drones, aircraft, and lasers.
And while cloud seeding is real, experts are saying that it can't possibly do what conspiracy theorists claim.
Why are people talking about Texas' weather modification?
One reason this conspiracy theory seems to have taken hold seems to have to do with the fact that a cloud seeding operation was completed on July 2, 2025.
However, the Associated Press notes that Rainmaker Technology Corporation's cloud seeding could not have caused the floods on the Fourth of July.
That's because cloud seeding can only generate a small amount of precipitation in existing clouds.
Aftermath Of The 4th Of July Flooding In Texas
In fact, Texas A&M University's director of the Texas Center for Extreme Weather explained that such a thing would be impossible using the technology, telling the Associated Press, "The claim that cloud seeding played a role in this tragic event is complete nonsense."
Hopefully, having a number of experts come forward and publicly disprove the cloud seeding theory allows the public to move on from it so that they can focus on the real reason for this devastating flood and work towards coming up with solutions so that nothing like this ever happens again.