"I long thought that interfering with surface level air flows has an impact on weather patterns."
When I worked with weather, most of the forecasters based a lot of their forecasts on the 500 millibar maps, especially for the two to three day outlook. I'm not sure the low level winds affect weather patterns except possibly on a very small basis. One of the reasons we flew balloons was to get that pressure data along with the winds aloft. BTW, IIRC the 500 MB level is usually between 40,000 to 45,000 feet MSL. I've been retired from that work since 1998. It's been a while.
PJ
