doc_text: Weather experts discussed the drought Thursday and its possible causes and effects, and said they hoped to produce a consensus on how much longer it will last.
  All of the speakers at the 1988 Drought Symposium called for more research and study.
  "There's an enormous number of possibilities that one could chase.
  The next business of the scientist is to eliminate the possibilities of ... and extend the range of analysis and look for cause and effect," said David Rodenhuis, director of the federal Climate Analysis Center in Washington.
  The symposium attended by 13 state and national experts was sponsored by The Weather Channel, an Atlanta-based cable network, which broadcast the meeting live.
  John Hope, the network's hurricane specialist and a former forecaster with the National Hurricane Center in Miami, Fla., said the drought in the Southeast might be lessened or ended in the next few months by a heavier than normal hurricane season.
  Hope said current weather conditions point to more tropical storms, more of which should become hurricanes, in this hurricane season.
  He stressed that a hurricane's effect on drought is variable, depending on the intensity and speed of the storm.
  Nevertheless, he said, some Southeastern states get as much as 25 pecent of their rainfall in some months from hurricanes.
  Georgia state climatologist Gayther Plummer told the symposium he thought the position of the planet Jupiter had something to do with drought in the Southeast.
  However, Rodenhuis said he was skeptical about Plummer's thesis.
  "It's very necessary to be cautious and analytical about the issue," he said.
summary_text: Weather experts are calling for more research and study in an effort to understand the conditions causing the present drought.
  At a weather symposium attended by 13 state and national experts, attendees stressed that there were an enormous number of possibilities to consider and that the job at hand was to extend the range of analysis in looking for cause and effect.
  A hurricane specialist said this year's hurricane activity is expected to be heavier than normal, but stressed that a hurricanes effect on drought is variable.
  Even so, some southeastern states get as much as 25 percent of the annual rainfall from hurricanes.