Chemtrails are one of the most popular conspiracy theories. Here’s what it means

By Leah Asmelash | CNN

We’ve all seen those white streaks trailing behind jets, creating stripes against the blue sky.

The lines are called contrails, short for condensation trails, and they appear when water vapor condenses and freezes around the exhaust from an aircraft, according to the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research.

At least that’s what science says. In recent years, a growing number of people believe that these contrails are actually chemtrails — a well-established conspiracy theory asserting that these trails aren’t made from condensation at all, but are instead chemicals being sprayed by the government.

Though the theory may sound far-fetched to some, chemtrails have become a common conspiracy both in the US and around the world, despite evidence to the contrary.

What is the chemtrails conspiracy theory?

The chemtrails idea has been around since 1996, and is largely rooted in an Air Force research paper from the same year, “Weather as a Force Multiplier: Owning the weather in 2025.” It outlines a “future weather modification system to achieve military objectives” using “aerospace forces,” and “does not reflect current military policy, practice, or capability,” the Environmental Protection Agency has stated.

At its most basic, the chemtrails conspiracy theory posits that contrails are not created by water vapor at all, but instead are a sign that the government, the wealthy, or some mix of the two, is secreting toxic chemicals into the air, creating these white lines.

Ideas about the purpose of these supposed toxic chemicals vary. Some believe the chemicals are being used to poison humanity, others say it’s for mind control, and some think it’s a way for the government to control the weather.

There’s no single official version of the theory, said Sijia Xiao, a PhD candidate at the University of California, Berkeley, who conducted a 2021 study exploring the chemtrails conspiracy theory and interviewing 20 believers and former believers. Instead, individuals “pick and choose aspects that resonate with them, mixing in personal interpretations or selectively adopting parts of the theory.”

How did the chemtrails conspiracy theory take off?

The idea that the government is spraying humanity with chemicals isn’t completely without base.

During the Cold War, the British government conducted more than 750 mock chemical warfare attacks on the general public, according to researchers. This subjected hundreds of thousands of people to zinc cadmium sulfide, a chemical chosen due to its small size — it’s similar to that of germs — and because it glows under ultraviolet light, making it easy to trace. The chemical was thought to be nontoxic at the time, though repeated exposure could be cancerous. The US did the same in the 1950s and 1960s — using the chemical as a tracer to test the dispersion of biological weapons.

Though these tests were decades ago, the theory has flourished — so much so that in 2016, the EPA published a 14-page document explaining contrails, outlining the chemicals used by the Air Force, and attempting to dispute the conspiracy.

In 2021, a Facebook post went viral claiming that President Joe Biden “manipulated” the weather through chemtrails and caused Texas’s week-long deep freeze that February — with hundreds of people engaging with the message.

On X, thousands of people follow accounts dedicated to tracking and posting proof of these chemtrails. One 2017 study, which had a nationally representative sample of 1,000 people, found that about 10% of Americans believed the conspiracy “completely,” while upwards of 30% of Americans at least found it “somewhat” true.

Belief in conspiracies is often traced back to skepticism of authority figures, Xiao said, and social media has also had a role in magnifying the problem.

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