319th OSS Weather Flight operates, rain or shine

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman Bonnie Grantham
  • 319th Air Base Wing Public Affairs
For most people, talking about the weather is a way to break the ice with someone new. For others, talking about the weather is a full-time job.

The 319th Operations Support Squadron Weather Flight operates 24-7 to keep Airmen and their families safe and to keep the mission moving forward.

"A lot of people just think weather is for the base and we just tell them when storms are coming," said Staff Sgt. Christopher Ford, 319th OSS Weather Flight NCO-in-charge. "That is a part of it, but after the aircraft takes off, we have to watch the mission and where the aircraft is and what the weather is doing around it."

The members of the weather flight are responsible for providing briefings and updates to pilots as they carry out their mission.

"We provide weather for all six combatant commands, to include flights in Afghanistan and Pacific Command," said Staff Sgt. Anna Harris, 319th OSS Weather Flight weather forecaster. "We put together briefings for the pilots and the mission planners, and we provide satellite and radar watches for the areas that they're working in and also if something's moving into the area."

Grand Forks AFB provides its own set of unique challenges for the 11-man team. One challenge they face is communicating with the pilots from a distance. Luckily for them, the Air Force is working to make this process easier.

"We are actually a testing bed for new software that links us directly to the flyers by embedding us with them," said Ford. "[Beale Air Force Base] is doing a similar thing, but we are leading the way."

To sum it up, the only way for the weather flight to communicate with the pilots in-flight right now is through SIPR net or on the phone. The new direction they're taking will allow them to communicate more directly with the pilots and also allow them to be more fluid and flexible with their predictions.

"The way we do weather now started in 2001 when the war kicked off, and they kind of just went with what they had. It's worked, but it hasn't added the value that we want to add," Ford said.

Another challenge that the team faces is the lengthy missions the Global Hawk is capable of flying.

"A long mission for manned aircraft would be 12 hours, but the Global Hawk mission is more than twice that," said Ford. "Instead of forecasting 12 hours from now, we have to forecast 30 or 40 hours from now."

Forecasting so far out at various regions of the world requires constant communication with weather hubs around the globe.

"We have to communicate a lot more with the people in the places where we have birds taking off because we can't just go outside and see what's happening," said Harris. "It's always better to ask someone who's really there rather than just assume things."

As for predicting weather on their home front, the 319th OSS Weather Flight learns a set of skills that many Airmen don't get to experience.

"We get a lot of experience measuring snow," Harris said. "We put out snow sticks. At my previous locations we never put out snow sticks because it never snowed like this. It's actually good because a lot of people get stationed in a place where they don't ever have to pay attention to that so they don't really know how to accurately measure snow."

Other weather factors that make North Dakota a challenge include year-long high winds and tornadoes during the warmer months.

"I get a very broad range of all the weather patterns here except hurricanes, obviously," Harris said. "There is severe weather in the summer and the winter and also in the transition periods. You get the full range experience."

Overall, Grand Forks AFB is enough to keep the weather flight busy all year long, rain or shine.

"I came from an Air Combat Command base with a very visible mission which I thought was going to hinder my thoughts about the mission here, but once I got into it and I saw what we were actually doing here I realized that we're doing just as much, you just don't see it," Harris said.

However, it's nothing the team can't handle, and they continue to lead the way in weather innovation.

"This is my first month in charge, and I'm lucky the team here is really good with various experiences and backgrounds," said Ford. "It makes us really good because we know different areas. Some of the things the [69th Reconnaissance Group] supports are directly linked to people on the ground, so if we can put more time to them, we're doing the right thing."