53rd Weather Squadron: At the eye of hurricanes - Air Force News | News from Afghanistan & Iraq - Air Force Times

53rd Weather Squadron: At the eye of hurricanes

One week, Irene. The next week, Katia swirling in the Atlantic and another storm brewing in the Gulf. And, the next week, maybe a tropical depression bouncing around the Caribbean.

That’s the way it is when it’s hurricane season and you’re a Hurricane Hunter.

From June through November, the 115 or so airmen of the 53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron fly specially rigged C-130s headlong into gut-churning winds and driving rains to collect the latest and most accurate storm statistics for forecasters at the National Hurricane Center in Miami.

August and September is the busiest time for the 53rd, a Reserve unit. All 20 crews are up and running 24/7 for those two months; half the squadron’s members work full time year-round.

At any moment, the 53rd can track three storms at once. In the past couple of weeks, the squadron kept tabs on Irene, then monitored Tropical Depression 12, which became Tropical Storm Katia and, finally, Hurricane Katia.

After all the attention paid to Irene, Air Force Times called a Hurricane Hunter to find out more about what the 53rd does.

Lt. Col. Sean Pierce, the squadron’s director of operations, touched on a wide range of topics — including weather hype — in a telephone interview from his office at Keesler Air Force Base, Miss.

Q. What does the average day look like for a Hurricane Hunter during hurricane season?

A. When you are flying a mission, it averages about 12 hours, so a duty day is about 16 hours — give or take. The challenge for us is that we get into a rotation that requires many days of continuous flying. This last storm, Irene, for example, we flew that for 11 days and logged about 250 hours. And that’s just one storm.

It’s a high op-tempo unit, and that continues through our winter storm season that ends in March. So our downtime is usually April and May.

Q. What data do you get from your flights that you can’t get from a weather satellite?

A. The Hurricane Center builds forecast models predicting the path, location and intensity of these storms as far out as they can. When storms are over land, we have the benefit of both space-based assets that look down on it and land-based Doppler radar. But when the storm is over water, we don’t have the benefit of those land-based assets any longer.

The space-based imagery is limited in terms of what it can provide concerning the atmospheric detail of the storm. So they need supplementation from one form or another. And since there are no weather balloons or radars over water, we extend that ground-based capability. The only way we can get it today is by obtaining it from within the storm. So what we do with the WC-130Js is penetrate the eye wall, fly the storm and take observations.

Q. What is the turnover in your unit?

A. There is very little turnover. Because we are a Reserve unit, there is no requirement for anyone to [have a permanent change of station].

This is a lifestyle that people either enjoy or they don’t. During peak season, everything is put on hold and it definitely impacts our airmen’s families. But it’s a commitment to the mission, so I think the people who enjoy that and who feel rewarded by what we accomplish and the people we help along the way — they tend to stick with it.

Q. There has been criticism about the forecast and media coverage of Hurricane Irene. How do you respond?

A. One way or another, the story is going to get sensationalized in the mainstream media because that’s what they do. We had an aircraft over the storm 24 hours a day for that entire week leading up to when it made landfall in Long Island and confirmed the data exactly as it was presented by the National Hurricane Center.

Things change within [any storm] and the forecast will change along with that, either in the direction that it’s moving or predicted intensity or what have you. But they had a clear and concise message that didn’t change for many days. I would say it gave those communities a fair amount of time to prepare that they wouldn’t have without that service.