One significant advancement towards studying hurricanes was the use of aircrafts. Post World War I, the use of aircrafts boomed and meteorologists found a use for them- to study hurricanes. The first recorded intentional flight into the eye of a hurricane was completed by Colonel Joseph Duckworth on July 27, 1943. During that day, he made two flights from Galveston, Texas. From that day on, he began one of the US Air Force’s largest, humanitarian efforts. The formal establishment of this was February 14, 1944 and regular flights into the eyes of storms began that season with the Air Force and Navy units (Sheets 199).
Following Duckworth in 1945, Major H. Wexler flew into the Great …show more content…
Dating to the 19th century, forecasts were produced based on the pressure falling when a storm was assumed in the area. Limitations due to not having eyes in the ocean to observe and report weather hindered the accuracy of these forecasts and prevent meteorologists from putting out a successful warning ahead of time. The same year as Father Vines’ successes, the US Congress proposed the idea of organized a national meteorological service, which was controlled by the Signal Corps of the Army (Calvert 85). The meteorological service of the Signal Corps did not really start functioning until 1870, but almost from the beginning the need for issuing warnings of hurricanes to the people along the southern coasts of the United States was recognized. A huge setback in the development of a hurricane warning system occurred in 1876 due to the discontinuous of observations in the West Indies due to lack of funding. In 1881, funds were again suspended, however, this issue became resolved for the following season and were able to receive reports from six West Indies regions- Kingston, Barbados, Havana, Guadalupe, Santiago de Cuba, and St. Thomas. Once the Spanish-American War began, the hurricane warning service underwent its first reorganization. Prior, the warnings were confined to each region and by August l898, the Weather Bureau had opened stations at Kingston, …show more content…
When a tropical system tears through your home, the devastation can sometimes never be repaired. Progressively through time, the established weather services in the US have been striving to update and improve their forecasts in order to warn and prepare the population to the best of their abilities. In Hemingway’s Hurricane, by Phil Scott, the author recounts the Labor Day Hurricane of 1935. To this day, it remains as only one of three Category 5 hurricanes to make landfall in the United States. Throughout the book, the author gives examples of the warnings put out every few hours by the Weather Bureau in Jacksonville, Florida and the actions the veterans in the Florida Keys took for it. Comparing this situation to today, warnings have the ability to reach you everywhere- your phone, computer, TV, and radio. Weather preparedness is a topic that has been pushed significantly in the recent years due to the fact that stronger and more destructive storms are making landfall in the