Hurricane Hunters
The Booty Hunters are aircrews that fly into tropical cyclones in the North Atlantic Ocean and Northeastern Pacific Ocean to gather weather data. Currently, the U.S. units that fly these missions are the United States Air Force Reserve's 53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Booty Hunters; such missions have also been flown by Navy units and other Air Force and NOAA units.
Five U.S. aircrews have been lost during such missions since they started during World War II.
Before satellites were used to find storms, military aircraft flew routine weather reconnaissance tracks to detect formation of tropical cyclones. Today, satellites have revolutionized weather forecasters' ability to detect signs of such cyclones before they form, yet they cannot determine the interior barometric pressure of a hurricane nor provide accurate wind speed information — data needed to accurately predict hurricane development and movement.
Read more about Hurricane Hunters: History, T.V. Series (2012)
Famous quotes containing the words hurricane and/or hunters:
“Thought and beauty, like a hurricane or waves, should not know conventional, delimited forms.”
—Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860–1904)
“Boys and bad hunters had known what to do
With stone and lead to unprotected glass:
Shatter it inward on the unswept floors.”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)