KEESLER AIR FORCE BASE, Miss. -- The 403rd Wing’s 53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron, Keesler Air Force Base, Mississippi, is gearing up for the future with some new potentially life-saving technology.
In October, the 403rd Maintenance Squadron’s Meteorological Equipment Technician Shop installed equipment on the squadron’s WC-130J Super Hercules aircraft that will allow the Hurricane Hunters to report weather data live as they fly into storms.
“This project has been in the works for a few years,” said Master Sgt. Crystal Register, noncommissioned officer in charge of the MET shop. “We have been working with different organizations to make this project happen. This will allow us to send much larger packets of data to include a live stream radar and a faster live chat program to speak with various organizations during flights.”
Some of the organizations and shops involved with this update include the MET shop, which helped to install the technology, avionics technicians who have been assisting with the testing, and civilian contractors who were critical in supplying the equipment and internet connection and updating the programs.
“We have accomplished both the ground testing and the test flight which was the biggest challenge we needed to overcome,” said Russ Evans, an avionics engineer with PCI Aviation. “The 53rd conducted a test flight over the Gulf of Mexico to ensure the equipment and system worked properly and did not interfere with the other mechanisms on the plane. This is going to bring big changes to the Hurricane Hunters.”
The findings from both testing segments were successful in proving the crew could collect and transmit video and data files from the aircraft to the server, Register said.
With these updates, radar imagery can provide another picture of how much precipitation is in certain portions of the storm and, in turn, will provide faster and more accurate data.
“For the Hurricane Hunters, this system provides a solution to transmit radar imagery in flight rather than waiting until landing anywhere from two to five hours after the information is captured,” Register said. “Having this internet and equipment installed will allow the crew to transmit larger data files and more information on the storms to forecasters and scientists.”
In turn, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Weather Service and other agencies that receive data from the Hurricane Hunters will be able to provide a deeper analysis of a storm’s intensity to improve tracking predictions and be able to have a better understanding of a storm’s path. This could potentially save thousands of lives.
The 53rd WRS even got to test out the new upgrades during a mission into Hurricane Milton in October. During the real-life scenario, ground computers located at Keesler were able to receive a live stream of weather data while the aircrew was in the middle of the storm.
Following hurricane season, the Hurricane Hunters planned to use the new upgrades during their annual atmospheric river missions, where they fly into “rivers in the sky” that can carry enormous amounts of precipitation. Once these “rivers” make landfall, they can release large amounts of rain or snow that can lead to catastrophic damages. During these missions, the crews release dropsondes which collect crucial information, like temperature, dewpoint, pressure, wind speed and direction. Once the data is collected, it is given to outside agencies and weather organizations that use it to further enhance weather predictions and reservoir management.
These flights are part of a research-based project that the 53rd WRS flies in support of the National Center for Environmental Protection to collect data to improve forecast accuracy.
(Bloodworth is assigned to the 403rd Wing public affairs office.)