The White Falcon - 17.12.1993, Blaðsíða 4

In the Spotlight: Weather Office
Tracking Old Man Winter
Story and photo by
JOl David W. Crenshaw
Editor's note: This is the first in a series of
In The Spotlight stories, focusing on various
commands around the Naval Air Station
(NAS) Keflavtk area.
“Iceland doesn’t have weather - it has
samples of weather.” Just ask anyone at
the Naval Atlantic Meteorological Oceano-
graphic Detachment Keflavfk, better
known as the Weather Office, and they’re
sure to agree.
From inside the converted air-traffic
control tower they share with Security, the
Weather Office has the sole responsibility
of tracking Iceland’s ever-changing
weather. According to AGCS(SW/AW)
Edward J. MacDonald, the Weather
Office’s command senior chief, even on a
sunny day in the summertime, staying on
top of weather trends can keep watch-
standers hopping. Now with winter upon
us, staying on top becomes even more
critical. “In the states, for example, an AG
would have a couple of hours to calm down
and relax after briefing pilots,” MacDonald
said. “Here, it’s an ongoing process from
the minute they take the watch to the time
they get off.
“Out of all my previous duty stations
combined, Iceland has the quickest
changing weather,” he continued. “The
weather always changes because we have
so much wind, which means the air masses
are constantly moving.”
Each person at the Weather Office
performs one of two main jobs - observing
or forecasting. According to MacDonald,
junior personnel serve as the observers,
reporting to the forecast duty officer on the
current weather conditions, and also serve
as the information collectors for the fore-
casters. The forecasters, or forecast duty
officers, crunch the data to provide the
forecasts. “Our average accuracy is
between 86 and 90 percent, which is pretty
good for a place like Keflavik. We can
give extended forecasts up to four days, but
after that it’s just voodoo,” he added.
The Weather Office provides oceano-
graphic support in addition to weather fore-
casting, but it isn’t necessarily top priority.
“Weather is our prime mission,”
MacDonald said, pointing out the office’s
recent name change from the Naval
Oceanographic Command Facility. “On a
day to day basis, probably the most impor-
tant thing we do is guaranteeing safety of
flights through the reports that we give the
pilots.” MacDonald explained, however,
that the safety of base personnel is just as
important and just as big of a job as the
safety of the flight operations.
Having qualified forecasters on-station L
critical, MacDonald said, especially in a
remote location like Iceland. “When you
have a forecaster on-scene, you get a better
quality forecast than when you have a fore-
caster back in the states, or any place else,
doing it for you,” he said. “There is no
one in Greenland putting out reports for us,
so we're on our own. We’re doing it pretty
much like a ship at sea. Our forecasters
have to rely on what they were taught in
school. They work it from the bottom up
and the top down, using satellite pictures,
surface analysis, balloon launches twice a
day, ozone samples and things like that.”
On a final note, MacDonald explained
that the Weather Office maintains an open
door policy with the community, and that
anyone interested in seeing their operations
is invited to pay them a visit. MacDonald
also invites any travelers to give them a
call at ext. 4302 or 7829 for information on
their destinations, whether it’s to
Reykjavik, London, Philadelphia or wher-
ever. They promise an accurate assessment
Manning the “Front” ...Watchstanders at
NAS Keflavik’s Weather Office observe cur-
rent conditions and keep Ch. 9's weather
reports up-to-date.
of what you should pack.
Perhaps as the old saying goes, everyon^
talks about the weather but no one does
anything about it The Weather Office is^(
certainly trying to do as much as they can.
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The White Falcon