AFW Support to Homeland Security

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Air Force Weather Support to Homeland
Security COPC Meeting 28 Nov 01
Lt Col Mike Babcock HQ USAF/ XOW
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Overview

• AFW - Who we are, what we do, and why
• Leveraging the meteorological community
• Cooperative support and backup
• Opportunities for Improvement

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AFW Demographics Who we are
AFW Units

• Active Duty AF
• Strat center (AFWA)
• 9 Opnl Wx Squadrons
• 132 Combat Wx Teams
• Air National Guard
• 33 Weather Flights
• AF Reserves
• Augment active duty

Total AFW Personnel 4040 Active Duty AF
3450 ANG/Reserve 590 (as of Apr 01)
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AFW Capabilities
Deliver to our Nation's combat forces anytime,
anyplace, the highest quality, mission-tailored
information, products, and services relating to
the terrestrial and space environment....from the
mud to the sun.
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AFW Core Processes
ALL ARE KEY TO PERFORMING OUR MISSION
ANALYSIS
DATA COLLECTION
DISSEMINATION
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AFW Organized for Ops
OPERATIONAL CONCEPT
Global Products
Leverage TechnologyManage Infrastructure
Strategic Weather Center
Operational Weather Squadrons
Fine-Scale Theater Products
Develop ForecastsOn-the-Job Training / Mentoring
Less Experienced Personnel
Combat Weather Teams (132)
Mission-Scale 2 Way Info
Lean, ExperiencedMission Knowledgeable Team
WARFIGHTER
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Weather Support Areas Of Responsibility
E
W
0
60
0
W
60
0
10
W
0
30
0
46
N
0
46
N
E
0
159
0
0
28
N
22
N
E
0
68
5
0
S
W
0
W
92
0
30
0
66.5
S
Areas of Responsibility
11 OWS (Elmendorf AFB) 15 OWS (Scott AFB) 17 OWS
(Hickam AFB)
20 OWS (Yokota AB) 25 OWS (Davis-Monthan AFB) 26
OWS (Barksdale AFB)
28 OWS (Shaw AFB) AFWA (Offutt AFB) USAFE OWS
(Sembach)
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OWSs Support Locations (CONUS)
USAF/AFRC/ANG Flying Unit
CONUS Regional Ops
ACC Army Units
Weather Squadrons
AFSOC Unit
Green indicates reengineered
Army NG Avn Unit
Scott AFB
Shaw
AFB
Davis Monthan
Barksdale
AFB
AFB
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AFW Capabilitiesleveraged by others

• Meteorological satellite processing and
  applications
• Cloud analyses/forecasts, Snow and Surface Temp
  analyses
• Fine-scale NWP model coupled with Land Surface
  Model
• LSM collaboration with NCAR, NCEP, Office of
  Hydrology
• Space weather support for all DoD and National
  Program customers worldwide observing network
  and collaboration with NOAAs Space Environment
  Center

Space Wx
LSM

• Improved support for DoD ops
• Low-level aircraft ops
• Trafficability for ground forces
• Dispersion of contaminants
• Smart weapons employment

Cloud forecasts 12 nm horiz res
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AFW Capabilities leveraged by others

• Climatology
• Global archival and analysis of weather
  observations
• ACMES (climo from meso models, constrained by
  NCEP/NCAR reanalysis fields)
• Slant-path Point Analysis Model
• Center collocated with NOAAs NCDC, Asheville, NC
• Collaborating with NOAAs NWS and OAR on climo
  support to USAID, DoS medium range forecasts to
  support refugee aid

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Atmospheric Dispersion

• AFW units provide met data to the consequence
  mgmt experts
• Joint Forces Command support
• AF civil engineer readiness teams
• Army nuclear, biological, and chemical teams
• AFWA, OWSs, and CWTs all support operations

• AFWA populates Met Data Server with
  high-resolution MM5 data for DTRA and other HPAC
  users worldwide
• Enables support for major events such as
  Olympics, inauguration, etc.
• For CONUS homeland security, NWS is primary, DoD
  secondary/backup

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Leveraging Operations

• NOAA
• NESDIS satellite data and services
• NWS/NCEP NWP models (AVN, Eta), forecast
  products
• NOAA/SEC Space Weather products
• Navy
• NWP models (NOGAPS)
• Ocean products (SST analyses, wave forecasts,
  etc.)
• All available (NOAA/NWS, Navy, foreign sources,
  etc.)
• Access to products via web pages, data via comm
  feed
• Observations, radar, TAFs aviation products,
  etc.

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LeveragingTraining, RD, acquisition

• Training
• COMET (UCAR lead sponsored by DOC, DoD, etc.)
• We provide joint formal training to Navy, USMC,
  USCG at Keesler AFB, MS
• RD Leverage best we find - transition to ops
• DoD research labs (AFRL, ARL, NRL)
• Fed civilian labs (NCAR, FSL, ETL, etc.)
• Academia (UPOS, CIRA, etc.)
• Industry (Weather Channel, CRDA with AER, etc.)
• Cooperative development and acquisition
• Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) Model
• NPOESS (DoD/DOC/NASA) NEXRAD (DoD/DOC/DOT)

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Cooperative Support and Backup

• AFW supports National Command Authorities,
  Navy/USMC, NOAA, Intel community, NIMA, National
  Hurricane Center, Joint Typhoon Warning Center,
  State Dept, DTRA, USAID, others
• AFWA provides backup to NOAA centers via official
  agreement
• Product backup for Aviation Wx Center, Storms
  Prediction Center, and Washington Volcanic Ash
  Advisory Center
• Mesoscale model backup (MM5) to NCEP Eta model
• Space Wx products to Space Environment Center
• AFWA is partner in OFCMs Cooperative Support and
  Backup Plan for operational processing centers
  (Shared Proc. Net.)
• AFWA provides high-res MM5 data to DTRA via HPAC
  met data servers, for use by DTRA and worldwide
  HPAC users
• Web page access via JAAWIN, JAAWIN(S), OWS web
  pages

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DoD Operations

• Roles and responsibilities
• Services Component Ops Organize, Train and
  Equip
• Joint operations Unified commands
• RD OUSD(ATL), Service labs (AFRL, ARL, NRL)
• Enduring Freedom (Afghanistan) CENTCOM has lead
• Joint Ops Area Forecast (JOAF) from Bahrain
  (Navy)
• Shaw OWS provides tailored reach-back support
• AFWA MM5 products, dust model, SOF/Intel support
• Noble Eagle (CONUS) JFCOM, NORAD have ops lead
• Higher ops tempo otherwise, business as usual

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Opportunities for Improvement

• Improved NWP and advanced data assimilation for
  satellite, radar, mesonet, and other data sources
• Weather Research Forecast (WRF) model
• Joint Center for Sat Data Assimilation
• Share processing load to overcome computing
  shortfall that limits CONUS high-res NWP models
• Unity of effort for Homeland Security NBC
  dispersion
• Improve interaction OFCM Workshops in Dec 2001
• One event, one forecast with NWS lead for weather
• Common portal to support multiple dispersion
  models facilitates RD, VV, ensembles, backup

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Choose The Weather For Battle
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