  We investigate experimentally the effect of wind on the dynamics of a viscous
liquid film flowing down a thread. The liquid film is well-known to destabilize
into an axisymmetric bead-like pattern in stagnant air. When the flowing film
is exposed to side-wind, the beads are pushed downstream breaking the symmetry
leading to a modification of the film flow. The viscous dissipation in the
liquid film decreases with increasing side-wind, leading to a faster slide
speed of the liquid beads. The inertia in the film is then increased, which can
induce a regime shift, triggering an instability. When the film becomes
unstable, it switches from a periodic pattern of equally sized liquid beads to
an irregular film pattern where large beads collide with smaller ones.
