Hypercanes can either supplement, or replace, other non-canopy mechanisms (extraterrestrial causes, volcanoes, jets of subterranean water, etc.) as the primary source of the worldwide rain at the start of the Flood. Hypercanes form from large (50 km diameter), superheated (50 C) thermal anomalies on the ocean surface, which have in turn been generated either by volcanism or hydrothermal action on the ocean floor. In the model hypercane, water material from the ocean is injected all the way into the stratosphere, which places the resulting ice clouds at sufficient altitude to remain aloft until they can be advected over continents. The ice crystals undergo repeated cycles of gravitational settling, sublimation, and recrystallization. This, along with conventional stratospheric-tropospheric exchange mechanisms, eventually makes copious amounts of water material available to synoptic weather systems in the troposphere, giving rise to considerable rainfall. Additional rainfall precipitates directly from any remaining ice clouds.
