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Transcript: Hurricane Hunters{Intro Music}[Mark Peterson] I'm Mark Peterson and this is the theme of podcast 2017 was the busiest Atlantic hurricane season for the United States and its territories in terms of landfall and impact. The science behind spotting and then tracking storms like hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Maria is remarkable. It involves satellites, sea level instruments, as well as data and samples taken by manned aircraft flying right through the center of the storm. In fact, storms like what we saw in 2017 were sampled hundreds of times by hurricane hunter aircraft. On this episode of the FEMA podcast, we spend some time with the brave men and women who take on this mission throughout the hurricane season and have the distinction of being called hurricane hunters.The hurricane hunters are a specialized group of aviators. Actually, there's two teams, one from the US Air Force and one from NOAA. Every year before the start of hurricane season, NOAA organizes a hurricane awareness tour throughout the Gulf Coast and the Caribbean. This is a free event open to the public, focused on raising awareness of the threats that these dangerous storms pose, and also highlight things like new forecasting techniques, but the coolest part has to be the Hurricane Hunters themselves. We traveled to Montgomery, Alabama to one of the five tour stops along the Gulf coast and had a chance to climb aboard with the air force Hurricane Hunters. Speaker 2:[Major Nicole Mitchell] My name is Major Nicole Mitchell. I'm an Aerial Reconnaissance Weather Officer, which we call ARWO because no one wants to say all those words all at once. Um, so basically I'm a meteorologist with the hurricane hunters, which is a squadron that flies into different types of storms, not just hurricanes. Um, and we fall under 403rd wing, which is out of Biloxi, Mississippi in the Air Force Reserve. So some of us, like myself, are part time and then we have some full time people as well. Speaker 3:[Mark Peterson] It's so great that you're spending time with us today. So when you say we fly into the storm, you really mean it literally. I mean, you're flying into the clouds, into the, the hardest part of the storm. Speaker 2:[Major Nicole Mitchell] Yeah, that's what we do. Um, so we will actually fly into anything from a developing area, what we call an invest area. We investigate it, see if there's actually that full circulation and have to call something a tropical depression. Um, and then once it gets going we have more continuous flights into it from tropical depression through tropical storm all the way to a cat five hurricane. And we actually in the winter do some winter storms over the water as well, like nor'easters. Speaker 3:[Mark Peterson] So we are here as part NOAA’s Hurricane Awareness Tour and we are standing right in front of the plane. So tell me about the plane that you all fly in and what type of plane is this? Speaker 2:[Major Nicole Mitchell] Sure. So this is a C 130. This is actually the typical C 130 that the military uses. Any plane that starts with a C means cargo. Um, we have a couple special things on for, for us, so because it's weather orientated, we call it a WC 130 for weather, but we can actually take the weather equipment off of it and use it again to haul troops or cargo or whatever else if we need to, but there's 10 just like this one that are specially formatted for doing the weather mission. So we have a couple flights that were having to do at once to maybe two different storms at the same time in different locations or one storm where we have to have flights in and out. We have enough planes so that we can cover all of that. [Mark Peterson] Unfortunately though we're standing on the tarmac and it's a pretty warm day and it's providing a lot of shade because it's a very, very large plane. And you're gonna give us a tour inside?[Major Nicole Mitchell] Sure. Should we go to that? [Mark Peterson] Let’s go![Major Nicole Mitchell] So this is clearly the ramp of the plane. Uh, if they were using it for something else, this could open and flight.[Mark Peterson] I could just imagine Airborne troops shooting right out of this.[Major Nicole Mitchell] That would be one thing. But for example, a few weeks ago, um, sometimes we work with other branches, so we were working with the Navy and we were in the North Atlantic using the ramp to dropout buoys for them that they were going to use for research. [Mark Peterson] As I’ve heard, a lot of the instruments, it doesn't necessarily just include aerial instruments you know sea level as well. So that's how you get them out there is to drop the buoys. [Major Nicole Mitchell] So the buoys we drop. Usually we’re working with the Navy when we're doing that. That's not as much part of our mission. We have the Sonde, which I'll show you and we drop that to get all the way down to the surface to see what the storm is doing.Speaker 2:[Mark Peterson] So the ramp is near the end of the plane. So we are entering the belly of the plane. [Major Nicole Mitchell] This is the inside and the thing is that our storm, we only have to have a minimum of five people, so two pilots, a navigator, meteorologists and a load master. So this could be a big empty plane in the middle of a storm with no one in it. We're using a C 130 because it is sturdy and we get buffeted around a little bit.[Mark Peterson] Just a little?[Major Nicole Mitchell] Depends on the storm. Uh, it has prop propellers, um, which is going to handle the weather better versus a jet engine would, which would intake all that water and cause problems and some of the lift that we'll need in a storm. And then the other thing about C 130 is we have over 14 hours of gas and our average mission is about 10 hours, six hours in a storm, but then however long it takes us to get there and get back. So sometimes it's over 13 hours. And so if we have the 14 hours of gas, you know, we have plenty of time to work with.[Mark Peterson] 13 hours..[Major Nicole Mitchell] It’s a long day. [Mark Peterson] I would guess it’s pretty turbulent too, and it's got to be a little exhausting. A lot exhausting, right? [Major Nicole Mitchell] Yeah. So those storms that are, you know, I don't get air sick, it doesn't really bother me. Um, but those storms, the few that I've had, that, the whole thing was turbulence for that whole six hours. Usually it's kind of just going through the eye wall or, or here and there. But I have had a couple of flights were really like the whole storm was turbulent and you're just physically exhausted after that. Even if you're not airsick or whatever else because your body's just.[Mark Peterson] You probably get this question all of the time because you fly with the Hurricane Hunters, but how does it compare to the average turbulence that you experience in a commercial plan? [Major Nicole Mitchell] I'll be honest, I kind of laugh, you know, and they won't even use the word turbulence anymore, right? They say, you know, we might have some rough air. I’m like come on it’s turbulence. Um, but yeah, a few bumps and everyone has to sit down with their seatbelts on and I'm sitting there going, but I get it. It's much safer to have your seatbelts on just in case. [Mark Peterson] We're looking at some of the seats. I mean you are fully strapped in the whole time. Not just like your seatbelt in a commercial plane. [Major Nicole Mitchell] So we're only required to have our seat belts on for takeoff and landing. Um, when, when we see my crew position, you'll understand why I don't always have my seatbelt on because I've got my computer and then I've got a window that's just a little off to the side and I want to be looking at it and actually seeing what the waves at the surface are like. So for me to kind of be twisting back and forth, um, a lot of times I don't have my seatbelt on unless it gets really bad and there's a handle at my workstation so I'm a little bit more likely to be holding onto the handle and trying to type and then I can be kind of moving around a little bit. [Mark Peterson] Okay. Let’s go take a look at your workstation. [Major Nicole Mitchell] Let's go. So we're headed up toward the front of the back of the plane. Uh, and then of course there's a cockpit beyond that. So the plane itself is collecting a lot of data as it goes along and it's most of the data you see comes from the plane. So as we're flying through the storm as low as 500 feet for developing storm and then as it develops a little more, either 500 or 5,000 or 10,000 feet but will be inside the storm. Speaker 2:So we're collecting data from the plane, temperatures, pressures, winds all that stuff. What I'm showing you right now is a drop sonde. [Mark Peterson] And so the plane looks like a tube, like a UPS tube.[Major Nicole Mitchell] It's about the size of my elbow to the tip of my hand long and it's got a little kind of parachute. It's really more of a stabilizer on it, but it's got instrumentation onside and it's linked to the plane. So what would happen is we would drop this out of the bottom of the plane and all the way until it hit the surface of the water. It'd be sending back weather data. [Mark Peterson] Are there little trap doors at the bottom of the plane so you…[Major Nicole Mitchell] So it's right here. There's this little tube and there's a shootout. [Mark Peterson] It sort of looks like those tubes at the bank that you would use to send up..[Major Nicole Mitchell] Yes, the pneumatic canisters.[Mark Peterson] Right, if you can't take your check to the teller. Speaker 2:[Major Nicole Mitchell] So this one goes down. It does make a little funk when it goes out the plane. We use that especially in the eye wall to give us a nice wind profile on a vertical level. The plane already has a horizontal, so that would give us a vertical and it collects all sorts of weather data, but especially from the center of the storm, we want it to find the lowest pressure because if you ever noticed how they show storms, they always talk about the pressure because the lower the pressure or the storm, when the pressure drops, the winds will crank up in correlation. So we watch pressure very closely. So this gives us an actual reading on the pressure from the surface. Um, yeah. So I'm at my workstation. I be so busy that we have people kind of helping us with some of those other elements because I literally have data coming in and especially when we're trying to get the center of the storm, NAC gives us coordinates as their best guests based on satellite or based on the last plane that was in and they're expected movement. Speaker 2:Those are never going to be exactly right on. So we'll plug in the coordinates will go that direction, but I'm actually using the winds to steer me to the exact spot where the circulation is because you want that center point to be exact. If we're just using satellite to guest where the center point is, let's say we just guess and it's, but it's 10 miles off, right? Ten miles off as our initialization point in the models tomorrow as you try to forecast the score storm could be 30 miles off. The next day that could be 100 miles off. So actually the biggest part of our job is finding that center circulation and actually following the winds. So I'll be saying to the pilots turn 10 degrees, left, turn 10 degrees, right. We're steering so I can find that exact circulation. So I'm busy and they're helping is the short story. Speaker 3:[Mark Peterson] But you know, you think about all the technology that we have in today's age, right? Satellites and drones and all different types of un-manned things. What's the value of having a human in the plane flying through the storm? Speaker 2:[Major Nicole Mitchell] Um, you know, the drones are always improving, but I think at this point, um, they, especially if it's something small doesn't quite have the maneuverability to get in there and without a person in it be kind of watching those winds and getting to that exact point. Um, we also have a meteorologist to interpret the radar and the presentation so I can tell them like, hey, I'm looking at the eye wall and it's doing a reforming cycle or there's a double eye wall and that's significant to the hurricane center because that means things in terms of intensification and a drone isn't going to understand that. So right now it's still better to have people in, do I think we'll get there someday with technology? Yeah, probably. But we're just not there yet. [Mark Peterson] We're also not at your workstation yet. [Major Nicole Mitchell] Okay. This big piece of equipment.[Mark Peterson] And it looks like one of those like 19 forties computer system where it's like the big bay [Major Nicole Mitchell] The big IBM or something? The huge super computer?[Mark Peterson] Yeah, but it looks very rugged. Speaker 2:[Major Nicole Mitchell] Right. So, so really the technology in here is far better than that. It's just, I'm a big metal container so that you can actually see at the bottom it's palletized. So if we wanted to take all of this off and use this like enormously C 130 again, we could. And so that's part of the reason it's sturdy, is that just anything in a C 130 and a big military plane is going to be built that way. The computer itself is the size of a normal computer. So this is the computer right here. All the data would be coming in. I'd be typing away whatever we needed to do. Usually on this screen is where I have the radar pulled up so I can kind of see what's going on. Um, our systems so that we can talk to each other because the see C 130 is so loud. Speaker 2:So that's our intercom system. And then here at the top, these two items, this is our satellite uplink to the hurricane center. So anything that we send goes almost live time right to the hurricane center, their stuff parceling every 10 minutes fine tune data, temperatures, pressures, winds. That just sends itself. Um, I'm always watching everything to make sure everything looks okay. [Mark Peterson] Are you communicating back to the hurricane center? [Major Nicole Mitchell] So some stuff automatically sends, but then I'm communicating so it's almost like email except just coming through satellite. So if they need something, they can send me a message, especially in lesser storms, like a tropical storm, or an area they're investigating. They might say, hey, we saw something weird on satellite. You could just go fly over there and kind of check that area out and get data for us. Usually in a hurricane it's so defined we have a very set pattern and there's actually kind of less direction in terms of that because there's not going to be anything too crazy that they're looking for other than the center of the storm. Speaker 2:But sometimes if we're close to a different country and we can't do our full pattern because we usually do legs that are about 100 miles out from the center to see how big the storm is. If we're getting toward another country or land, we might coordinate with them saying, you know, which way do you want us to turn it? Is there something specific you're looking for on this side of the storm or something like that. [Mark Peterson] So you talked about the path. So there is a definitive path that you plan to do and where do you enter the hurricane versus come out? [Major Nicole Mitchell] So we do a cross pattern, so through the eye, we will come in from one direction, go out the opposite direction, repositioned and go in a different. So we've actually gotten each inter cardinal, um, so we've hit the sides northeast to southwest, southeast to northwest. And we do that because we don't want to just know what the center of the storm is doing, but we want to know how far out the tropical storm or hurricane force winds. Different storms are different sizes. So that helps us find out the size, which side is worse, maybe has higher winds or more a thunderstorm activity. Um, and then that x pattern, we do two of those. So that puts us through the eye four different times. And in the storm for about six hours and the trend of all that and it gives us a trend. So now we've seen each side of the storm at least twice and the center four times. So we can see is pressure dropping over time? What's the movement over those six hours? Things like that that are valuable versus just one snapshot.[Mark Peterson] I mean when you kind of put it in that kind of perspective, you're 13 hour flight. [Major Nicole Mitchell] Well it can go to 13 hours. It's usually about 10.[Mark Peterson] 10 hour flight. I mean that is a very active flight. 10 hours.[Major Nicole Mitchell] Right. So that's why I said the blue master has a piece of the puzzle releasing the sonde, you know, I'll coordinate it, but he helps and he helps coordinate that data, he or she, the NAC is helping watch the radar and run the radar because I'm, I'm doing data most of that time. And also helping direct the plane if we need to steer a little bit to find the center. [Mark Peterson] How long, how many times are you going up? Is it everyday?[Major Nicole Mitchell] It depends on, it depends on the season and what's going on. So last year was clearly a very busy season. Um, we have, have to have by military rules, 12 hours of crew rest before so, and um, our flight isn't just our flight time. We go in over two hours early prep everything, make our plan for the flight, after the flight debriefs, I'm working with the hurricane center and make sure they got everything they needed to get. So if it's a 12 hour flight, it's a 15 hour day. Um, so technically they might not be able to fly US everyday because you add in crew rest and the daytime, if we're deployed a lot of times we'll do day and then the next night and then fall and then the next day and do it's crazy schedule. But it just depends on how much we have to fly and who's available.[Mark Peterson] So talk to me a little bit about, from your perspective as a meteorologist, how the physical work that you're, the actual work that you're doing here on the plane connects with what the satellites are collecting and what the sea surface instruments are getting and then how is it all put together as a package? [Major Nicole Mitchell] So they're all different pieces of the same puzzle. Um, I, I wouldn't say that we should replace satellites or a buoy or anything else. You need as much data as you can get because a satellite might see, you know, as I'm flying, it's just a cross section. Whereas satellite might have a broader picture, but I being inside can get a more specific pressure, then the satellite can get. So we're complimenting each other. Not one is better than the other. With our data added to the rest of the mix, it, they say it improves the forecast by about 25 percent, which is a huge difference when you look at how big the cone of uncertainty is, how many people we potentially had to evacuate. So our data helps whittle down that uncertainty area and give them more targeted forecast. And even just in terms of evacuation, every extra mile that we can improve on, they say it averages about a million dollars a mile to evacuate. So it's a huge money savings. To me, I think it's even more important if you're over evacuating are over forecasting because you don't have the best data. I think people get a little immune to it after top, after awhile. Um, so if you're, you're raising the warning to more people than you have to because you don't have a good forecast then is someone going to take it seriously when they have to? Yeah. So our data helps improve that forecast and by doing that, by being able to target it, I think people take it more seriously because they're getting better data. So they know when I hear a warning, okay, they're doing a good job in these forecasts. We got to go.[Major Nicole Mitchell] We’re going to the flight deck. So it's hotter up here because we're just sitting out in the sun today. The air conditioning is not on. So my apologies for that.[Mark Peterson] Is the air conditioning ever on in here?[Major Nicole Mitchell] You know, so we switched from, this is a C 130 J Model and we switched over for the H Models in 05 and I'm actually our last meteorologist that flew on the H. Um, and so the pilots were all excited because this is what's called a glass cockpit. So you can see, you know, all the monitors our screens versus some of the old instrumentation that they used to have. So they were all very excited about that grade. Um, for me it was kind of the same weather equipment because of the palettes that I was talking about. Um, so what I was excited about was a much more comfortable chair, which is a big deal in a 10 hour flight, bouncing around, bouncing around in a hurricane. Speaker 2:Um, and so, we can in those investments, as I mentioned, where are a storm that's just developing, be as low as 500 feet that is in the tropics. So the temperature is 80 or 90 degrees outside. It's hot, it's humid. If you were outside those old model planes, the air conditioning did not keep up, so we would just sweat through our uniforms. Um, so the two things I was excited about the J Model plane, comfy seat, good air conditioning. But as I said, a lot of other really important upgrades, but.[Mark Peterson] I didn't, I guess I didn't realize, um, you would go as low as 500 feet. I mean, that has got to be pretty visually, pretty stunning to see the amount of waves. [Major Nicole Mitchell] If it's a suspect area or lessor tropical storm, you might be that low. The parameter for that level is 500 to 1500. Usually we try and do a thousand. We get that low if we're trying to get below clouds and actually see the ocean. And so my first storm flight ever was Hurricane Charlie in 2004 and I, so I'm a brand new meteorologists. I'm with an instructor. One of the things we do that they want us to be able to do is look at the waves and know based on the waves, what the winds are. So if it's just a little waves, you know, a lot, not a lot of wind. If it's huge waves with a, they get green once they get that much air in them with green streaks and other things, you know, you know, it's a lot faster. So he's like, well just practice looking at the waves and we'll do some other things. And so we were the first flight into Charlie and that was 04, which was a busy season, then it just got eclipsed by 2005. Speaker 2:And so usually we fly stuff when it's still in the investigation stage. That season before we could even get up into things, they kept upgrading them to tropical storms because, you know, they were just developing that quickly and so we get in there and they're like, you could do low level because it's still, you know, lesser storm. And so we're flying that x pattern and um, it was so far away that we were only going to have time to do one with our gas. Um, and the last corner that we came out, so to speak, was the northeast side, which can often be the more intense side. Um, so we'd flown through the whole storm and we were like, well, this is stronger than they thought it was. This is a good tropical, this is a good tropical storm, not just like a lesser tropical storm. So it's clearly still intensifying. And we flew out the northwest east side and I'm looking out the window. I'm down at where workstation is now because our work station used to be up here in the flight deck and so I was back there at the window watching the waves and I was like looking at it and I'm like, that's a hurricane. I mean I know I'm new, but I'm pretty sure that's a hurricane. So I called up to my instructor and I said, instructor I think is the need to take a look out the window, and he comes down and he's like, oh, that's a hurricane, and then of course everyone's pressed to the windows then end and it was just. It was incredible. It was so beautiful because of the color of the water with the irrigation. It was green when the wind whips off the kind of white caps it streaks it and we call it with that green color, a shattered glass effect. It's just gorgeous. And of course my camera was in the back of the plane. I'm like, oh, this isn't going to last long. Do I go and try and get the camera or do I just enjoy it? And I just sat and enjoyed it. [Mark Peterson] That’s a view that humans never ever get.[Major Nicole Mitchell] And I’ve never see it sense, because we were so low, I've seen it from many, many thousands of feet above. Um, and so when we landed that day and everyone talked about it, they were like, okay, so we shouldn’t have been that low because we didn't know the storm was going to be that strong, but you don't want to be that low because when a strongest stormer is stronger than the turbulence, you know, in theory you could get a downdraft that was that whole 500 feet. So that's why we go to different levels when a storm is stronger. So, you know, so that we have that recovery room, But for me as a newbie, I was like, do I get to see this every time? This is great. And they were like, no, none of us have seen that before because we're not usually that low. So should we go out?[Mark Peterson] Thanks for an amazing tour of an amazing plane. The work that you do is just really amazing for um, for the work that we do at FEMA and the emergency managers that are taking the information that you have. [Major Nicole Mitchell] You asked me about the data in the storm, but that's one piece of a puzzle, you know, we've done this tour for a couple of days now and we've had emergency people on the ground thanking us for work and it's like, well, thank you for your work too, because they're, they're the people that help evacuate people and so I really do see it as we're just all part of a big puzzle trying to keep everybody safe in these situations. [Mark Peterson] Absolutely. Major, thank you so much for your time. We’ve linked to this episode on our FEMA Facebook page and we invite you to join the conversation in the comments. If you have ideas for future topic, send us an email at fema-. If you would like to learn more about this episode or other topics, visit podcast. ................
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