Mark twain, I believe, once remarked that there is more said and less done about the weather than any other subject under the sun. That statement is no longer strictly true. We are at least trying to do something about it in addition to talking and praying. In the last seven years the Navy has been taking up the subject seriously. And to the Navy, above all others, weather should be a serious proposition. To the farmer weather may mean loss of his crops, to the transoceanic passenger it may mean loss of his dinner, to the horse it may mean horseflies, but to the Navy it may mean the loss of a battle, the loss of a war, loss of life itself. History shows us that it has meant that to navies for 2,322 years and more. For the first 2,315 years we did nothing about it. The problem isn’t solved yet. Two thousand years is a long time and one sort of gets into a rut in that time. It is actually habit forming and we’ve gotten into the habit of considering weather as a series of secret surprises contrived by the gods for their amusement and our discomfort, or as a punishment for our sins. In a way it is a punishment for our sins. The sin has been our failure to use the brains given us to understand and apply the laws by which the universe is run.
Back in 480 b.c. the Greeks were given great credit for routing the Persians at the Battle of Salamis. It is casually mentioned that four hundred of the Persian ships were destroyed by a gale shortly before the battle and a considerable number more by a thunderstorm after the first day of battle. The Greek ships were anchored in the lee of Euboea and lost nothing. If the Greeks didn’t have a good aërologist on board, they must, at least, have had an admiral with rheumatism.
Again prior to the Battle of Actium in 31 B.C. Mark Antony’s galleys were held in the harbor for four days by southwest winds until Octavian had time to blockade him. Two thousand years later those same southwest winds were delaying our 30,000-ton dreadnoughts in San Pedro harbor with fog. The ships have changed but we have the same old weather. Perhaps that is fortunate, for weather has certainly furnished a wonderful alibi for the losers in nearly every important naval battle.
History provides us an almost endless number of examples. Before Lepanto in 1571 a.d. the Christians were almost destroyed by a storm but Don Juan was somewhat of a weather prophet and got the fleet into port before it broke. A few days later at the battle, the wind dropped to a calm, the Turks couldn’t close up, so the Christians got the victory and the Turks got the alibi.
In 1588 the Great Armada was beaten and destroyed by weather slightly assisted by the English fleet. When they left port a storm separated and scattered forty of the ships; on May 30 an inferior English force was sighted but escaped in the rain and fog; on July 31 a shift of wind gave the weather gage to the British; and again on August 2 a shift of wind enabled a trapped English force to escape. Of course, one may say that these engagements were fought when ships were so small that they depended more on weather conditions but modern examples are not lacking.
The Grand Fleet waited for two years for a chance to destroy the German High Seas Fleet and then when the opportunity came at Jutland, in came fog and mist so thick that we are still wondering who won the battle. Our ships may become obsolete but our weather will not, at least not soon. We may spend years and billions of dollars building a fleet that is capable of destroying an enemy; a twelve-hour fog may prevent us from doing it.
The above instances are only a few of many cases where the weather has been the deciding factor in important battles. Any thinking naval officer will admit that weather is of utmost importance to naval operations, “but what,” he asks, “are we going to do about it? We can’t pass a law against it. We can neither stop it nor start it. And we can’t avoid it. Even California has it.” The answer is: We can use it. We must use it. Weather works by natural physical laws. We can discover and apply those laws to find out what the weather will be and when. In that case the weather can be made to work for us instead of against us; to give us a victory instead of an alibi.
As stated earlier, the problem has not been completely solved. The physical and dynamic laws governing the weather are comparatively simple. The effects of these laws, their observation, and application are complicated and involved. To perfect the science of weather forecasting an enormous amount of hard work and a great deal of intelligent experience are still necessary. Progress during the past few years has been very rapid. The Navy now has a small corps of trained aërologists. These officers have spent two years studying the physics and dynamics of the atmosphere and the fundamentals of weather prediction. They have had a sufficient ground-work to enable them to analyze intelligently weather phenomena and to issue forecasts of future weather which are accurate to some degree. At present the general average of accuracy in forecasting is probably about 75 per cent for thirty-six hours in advance, including all elements—wind direction and velocity, cloudiness, fog, precipitation, visibility, and temperature. That leaves plenty of room for improvement, but it is far better than pure guesswork or rolling the dice. To eliminate that 25 per cent error, much more investigation, both theoretical and practical, must be carried out and much more experience attained. Perhaps all of it will never be eliminated but it is worth trying regardless of the cost and effort expended. A problem that has been with us for two thousand years is not solved in a day.
Of course, we have the Weather Bureau. Their co-operation and assistance is invaluable but the Weather Bureau, unlike the poor, is not always with us. Their problems are considerably different from ours. Their problem is forecasting, mostly over land, for agriculture and commerce. Ours is that of training to forecast exactly the wind, fog, and visibility for our one great day; the day of battle. And that battle will probably occur outside the jurisdiction of the Weather Bureau.
How can the Navy as a whole contribute to solving the scientific problems of aërology? The answer is simple. All of the Navy can help in the same way that they have helped in developing the science of radio communication, namely, by using it. The more it is used the more valuable it will become. The automobile would still be an experimental toy if everybody continued to use horses. The general impression has been, and still is to some extent, prevalent that aërological information is only for the use of aviators. On the contrary, practically every naval activity from firing torpedoes and laying mines to love-making on park benches is dependent for maximum success on aërological information. It is not necessary to mention to naval officers the effect of fog, clouds, wind, sea, visibility, degree of darkness, etc., on fleet problems, maneuvers, and battles. Every officer knows these things well. The necessity is to bring these officers to the realization that this information is now available and to the habit of making use of it in preparing their plans. The aërologist may be wrong in his forecasts, perhaps frequently, but if his information is the best available, why not use it?
Forecasting is not the only function of aërology. Aërological units are equipped to obtain upper wind directions and velocities, air densities, cloud heights, sea and air temperatures, to record and report on climatological factors, frequency of change, and range of the elements. Knowledge of all of these items is frequently of value to a commander. Recently an investigation of upper air densities at Guantanamo showed that the structure of the air there was sufficiently different from the structure found at Dahlgren, Virginia, to make a 200-yard error in a shell fired at long ranges. Is that difference to be found at other places in the same latitude as Guantanamo? Is it to be found at other seasons of the year? We do not know because such investigations have not been made. The Navy has planes and it has aërological personnel who would like to find out. Why not use them? The computation of wind and density ballistics for gunnery is important.
There are some officers now who are making full use of the information available and putting forth every effort to improve it, but there are still many who ignore the possibilities offered because the forecasts are sometimes wrong. Ten years ago many people would not buy a radio because the static spoiled the music. Fortunately, there were enough people who listened to static, with the result that static is now largely eliminated. No doubt there is still too much static in weather forecasts, but if enough people will endure the static while complaining about it, perhaps it, too, will be cut down.
Let us return to the primary problem of the aërologist, that is, forecasting the weather for the day of battle. All other issues should be subordinated to that. In these days of long-range guns and aircraft, the weather may play a more important role on the day of battle than it did in the days of sailing ships. How far will we be able to sight the enemy? How high will the clouds be, if any? Will there be fog? Will the sea be rough or smooth? Will the wind be northeast or southwest? Will a smoke screen lie properly? And most important, to what extent can we depend on full use of our aircraft? For correct answers to these questions the day before the battle, the commander in chief might well trade a division of battleships.
At present practically all of the reports on which a weather forecast can be made long distances at sea are collected by the Weather Bureau from merchant ships and broadcast by radio. In war time these reports from merchant ships probably would not be sent. The fleet with its scouting lines, its light forces, its submarines would cover a large area. Reports from all of these sources would probably furnish far better data for weather forecasting than the reports received in peace time* from the merchant ships. However, there is, as yet, no plan adopted for systematic collection and dissemination of this information within the fleet. A very simple plan for this will suffice and need not add greatly to the volume of radio traffic required. Yet lack of such a plan prior to hostilities might be fatal. A simple code of ten letters can carry a full report of weather conditions at any given point. Another code of twenty or thirty letters can be used to make a thirty-six hour forecast of all essential conditions. Both can be readily enciphered. No additional organization is necessary. All we need is a co-ordinated plan and a little experience in the use of it.
Aërology in the Navy is just beginning. When war comes again it should be one of our greatest assets. If it is to be that, it should be further developed. To be further developed, it must be used by the whole Navy now to the fullest extent. There is much to be done, but the results to be achieved certainly can be and will be worth the effort.