From the Usual USAF Source...
Slow Season for USAF Hurricane Hunters
The Air Force Reserve Command's 53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron at Keesler AFB, Miss., flew a record low number of hurricane tracking flights this past winter, states a base release. In fact, it was the "fourth slowest winter weather reconnaissance season on record," according to a report from the Chief Aerial Reconnaissance Coordination All Hurricanes unit at the National Hurricane Center in Miami. The National Weather Service typically tasks the 53rd WRS to gather data while flying over the Pacific Ocean, but did not do so this past winter in order to develop an analysis for cost-effectiveness, states the April 7 release. "The low number of flight taskings can partly be attributed to the fact that many of this year's storms moved West to East over land and did not start over water where reconnaissance flights could have benefited the forecasts," said John Pavone of CARCAH. The 53rd WRS had deployed previously to JB Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Hawaii, and JB Elmendorf-Richardson, Alaska, to track hurricanes. "The models used by the National Weather Service are becoming more sophisticated and better at analyzing future conditions over North America," said Lt. Col. Jon Talbot, 53rd WRS chief meteorologist.
Wait! How can this BE? Weren't we told that we'd get more and bigger storms due to global warming climate change? This isn't good news for the Hurricane Hunters who will miss those Hawaii deployments (but NOT the Elmendorf ones).
Speaking of those Hurricane Hunters...
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| A WC-130J from the 53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron takes off in support of Operation Surge Capacity here (ed: Keesler AFB, Miss) April 5, 2014. Sixteen aircraft from the 403rd Wing took part in Operation Surge Capacity, a large scale training exercise designed to test the 403rd Wing's ability to launch and recover a large formation of aircraft and to execute airdrops. (U.S. Air Force photo/Tech. Sgt. Ryan Labadens) (Click for count-the-rivets size) |
Those guys standing by the runway in the pic? That's one of the fairways on the Keesler Airplane Patch golf course, with Biloxi's Back Bay in the background. Keesler is a pretty nice base, appearance-wise. I spent a couple of years there, in the aggregate, going to various electronics schools during my career. I hated nearly every damned minute of my stays, especially the first time I was there in 1963 - 64. Why then? Because I lived in non-air conditioned splendor for an entire summer on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, with two room mates. That's why. I do believe Biloxi and its environs has some of the most miserable weather in all of the United States.
Somehow the questions that Sessions asks of people like this never find their way into the news. We get another freak at the EPA. Thank you Nixon for giving us the EPA in the first place.
ReplyDeleteThere were a lot of reasons to not like Tricky Dick, but establishing the EPA has to be THE reason he'll burn in Hell.
Delete"...I lived in non-air conditioned splendor for an entire summer..."
ReplyDeleteI, too had the pleasure of those very same types of accommodations.
First, in unheated barracks at Treasure Island in SF in the winter of '61-62.
Thence on to Pearl Harbor NavSta through the summer of '62 with no air, while the ship was being rebuilt in the shipyard.
The frosting on that cake was the CO on that ship determined the rebuild could come in under cost by eliminating A/C from the crew quarters.
I suppose the ossifers had AC in their staterooms? I don't even know why I asked...
DeleteHeh, you just weren't stationed there long enough for your blood to thin out, Buck. GOT to "acclimatize" yanno? :)
ReplyDelete(I'm actually sort of serious about that, Buck. My dorm rooms@LSU were un-air-conditioned and the first two years were hell, but the next two come Nov. night football games I'd get kinda chilly in the 2nd half whereas with the same temp I was sweating in previous years...a full hour of ROTC Drill formation @1400 in the worst of the late spring/early fall heat was STILL not for the faint of heart, however..
"Acclimatize," my ass. To this day I don't understand why that part of the world is inhabited. :-)
DeleteI remember salt tablet dispensers in the open bay barracks bathroom at Keesler, and at Lackland in 72. I took them, but I'm pretty sure they didn't work, because my uniforms always were wet. I learned to wear two t-shirts.
ReplyDeleteI'd forgotten about those salt tablets and you're right: they didn't do any good at all.
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