Thesis (M.A.)--Dartmouth College, 2002. / Available online with permission from the author.

Accurate weather forecasts are vital to air combat operations. Quantitative assessments of forecasts and their operational impacts are essential to improving weather support for war fighters. We adapted an existing U.S. Navy, web-based, near-real time system for collecting and analyzing data on the performance and operational impacts of military forecasts. We used the adapted system to collect and analyze data on Air Force Weather (AFW) forecasts, and the planning and execution of flying operations, at six Air Combat Command and Pacific Air Forces bases. We analyzed the data to develop quantitative metrics of forecast performance and operational impacts. Our results indicate that planning weather forecasts (PWFs) have a higher potential for making positive contributions to air operations than do mission execution forecasts (MEFs). This is notable because AFW units spend significantly less time developing PWFs than MEFs. Surface visibility, cloud ceilings, and cloud layers caused most negative mission impacts, indicating these phenomena should be a focus of future research and training. We found high levels of mission success even when forecasts were inaccurate, perhaps due to aircrew and mission flexibility. Our analyses revealed a need for improved education of flying units on the nature and availability of AFW products.

Thesis (M.S. in Meteorology)--Naval Postgraduate School, March 2006. / Thesis Advisor(s): Tom Murphree, David Smarsh. "March 2006." Includes bibliographical references (p. 97-99). Also available online.

In tracing the history of the TIROS meteorological satellite system, this dissertation details the convergence of two communities: the DOD space scientists who established US capability to launch and operate these remote sensing systems and the US Weather Bureau meteorologists who would be the managers and users of satellite data. Between 1946 and 1964, these persons participated in successive coalitions. These coalitions were necessary in part because satellite systems were too big—geographically, fiscally, and technically—to be developed and operated within a single institution. Thus, TIROS technologies and people trace their roots to several research centers—institutions that the USWB and later NASA attempted to coordinate for US R&D. The gradual transfer of persons and hardware from the armed services to the non-military NASA sheds light on the US’s evolution as a Cold War global power, shaped from the “top-down” (by the executive and legislative branches) as well as the “bottom-up” (by military and non-military scientific communities). Through these successive coalitions, actor terms centered on “basic science” or the circulation of atmospheric data were used to help define bureaucratic places (the Upper Atmospheric Rocket Research Panel, International Geophysical Year, NASA, and the World Weather Watch) in which basic research would be supported by sustained and collaboration could take place with international partners.