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Chemtrails if you subscribe to the conspiracy theories (and I don't); contrails if you subscribe to the meteorology (and I do). Their longevity is actually due to the prevailing conditions aloft today. Best, Ian

Hi Pat -
No, of course I'm not implying only civil airliners cause contrails - military aircraft will obviously do so just as readily, above certain altitudes in certain atmospheric conditions. That's merely scientific fact - hardly anything sinister. Indeed, witness any old film footage of B17's, B24's or B29's (plus piston-engined fighters in the Battle of Britain) above Allied and Axis skies in WW2 and you'll see ample demonstration that military aircraft were creating contrails even back then (and - being rather occupied with other pressing matters - they were hardly busy cloud seeding or such-like!).
Cloud seeding is a wholly different matter in any case - well documented and analysed in scientific literature, in the media too; experimented with over decades in varying forms and hardly a 'secret' in the strict definition.
I would make a safe bet that military aircraft transponder codes are rarely, if ever, going to appear on free-to-view flight tracking websites. And why would they want to?! It would be a rather daft defence strategy to publicise themselves in such a manner! Civil flights tend to follow the established upper airways, reporting points and intersections, albeit with some exceptions to avoid potentially severe weather (e.g., clear air turbulence; severe thunderstorms, etc).
The visible contrail patterns we see are very evidently caused innocuously by the very presence of aircraft, civil or otherwise. The longevity and other features of these anthropogenic clouds is quite easily demonstrated by science, rather than by pseudo-science and fantasy. Whilst the 'chemtrail' stuff remains in the realms of science fiction, a much more compelling and worthy study (worth a web search, incidentally) examines the potential influence of contrails on our climate. And again, it's not anything secret.
Finally, the ´óÏó´«Ã½ web 'spot' graphics you cite cannot possibly keep-up with every veil of cirrus moving here-and-there aloft - anymore than other summary weather web graphics can do so, from other weather providers. The website www.sat24.com is always worth a peek for checking the prevailing cloud cover in near realtime (and occasionally - like this morning - you can spot contrails, too!).
All the best - and thanks for contributing to the blog,
Ian

Incidentally - when I refer to 'chemtrails' I of course mean in the accepted sense of some deliberate conspiracy effort, rather than the inevitable release of various exhaust chemicals / aerosols within contrails from the passage of any aircraft aloft.