Part 16

Norton squeezed between the map man and the wall and sat down at the teletypewriter in the corner after the operator had stepped out into the hall. The office was crowded and when one man wanted to leave his place, nearly everybody else had to stand up to make room. Norton rang a bell, rattled the teletypewriter, and finally got Commander Loveland on the line down at the Navy office.

This was an exclusive line--Weather Bureau to Navy--and Norton pecked out a message. "Looks like a bad hurricane out there. It's maybe three days from Florida if it comes here, but it probably won't. Looks like it would go up toward the Carolinas. We can't be sure. Maybe we should have a recco this morning. What do you think?"

"Think we can get one up there from Puerto Rico this morning," came the message from Loveland. "I'll see what I can do. Did you check with the Army?"

"Yes, the Major talked to Colonel Ellsworth and he says they expect to get a plane out there from Borinquen this afternoon. Also, I asked for clearance on a public message yesterday and got an OK last night."

At that time, because of the war, public releases about storms along the coast were still restricted and had to be cleared with Naval Operations in Washington. If enemy submarines learned that planes were being evacuated from airports on the seaboard, they were emboldened to come out in the open and attack shipping along the coast. Oil tankers and other ships would have a bad enough time in the storm without running into submarines openly on the prowl. But the Chiefs of Staff had to balance this against the possible loss of life and property in coastal communities.

On their mission to explore the storm, the Navy crew from Puerto Rico ran into heavy rain and turbulence. Visibility was nil as they approached the center. They stayed down low to keep a view of the ocean but found the altimeter badly in error. As soon as they broke out of the clouds, they found the sea was much closer than they had figured. The plane was almost completely out of control several times. They changed course, got out of the storm, sent a message to Miami, and returned to Ramey Field in Puerto Rico.

Steadily the hurricane kept on a west-northwest course, increasing in size and violence. As it went along, the aircraft of the Navy and Air Forces were on its heels and driving toward the center, like gnats around an angry bull. It was headed for the Carolinas; everybody was agreed on that now. Ships were in trouble, running to get from between the hurricane and the coast as the winds closed in, and anxious people waited for the next report.

At that time, a hurricane was thought to have four stages of existence. First was the formation stage, often with circulatory winds and rain developing in a pressure wave coming westward over the Atlantic or Caribbean. Second, it quickly concentrated into a small but very violent whirl and, over a relatively small area, had the most violent winds of its existence. In this stage it might not have been more than one hundred miles in diameter. Third, it became a mature storm, spreading out, and although its winds did not become any more violent, they spread over a much larger area, maybe as much as three hundred miles, or more, in diameter. Fourth was the stage of decay, when it began to lose its almost circular shape and the winds began to diminish. Now it went off to the northward and became an extra-tropical storm or struck inland in the south and died with torrential rains and squally winds.

This hurricane seemed to be an exception. As it spread out to cover a bigger area, its winds seemed to develop greater fury. A Navy plane went in as it approached the Carolinas and found extreme turbulence, winds estimated at 140 miles an hour, torrential rain that penetrated the airplane, and no visibility through the splatter and smear on the windows. And when the stalwart crew came down below the clouds, the sea was a welter of foam, with gusts wiping the tops off waves that reached up to tremendous heights.

While no planes were lost in probing this terrible storm, a destroyer, a mine sweeper, two Coast Guard cutters, and a light vessel were sunk. An Army plane estimated the winds at 140 miles an hour. The weather officer, Lieutenant Victor Klobucher, said that it was the worst storm that had been probed by the hurricane hunters up to that time. The turbulence was so bad that, with both the pilot and co-pilot straining every muscle, the plane could not be kept under control, and several times they thought it would be torn apart or crash into the sea. On returning to the base, the fliers found that 150 rivets had been sheared off one wing alone.

On the morning of the fourteenth of September, the terrible tempest was close to the eastern tip of North Carolina, apparently destined to sideswipe the coast from there northward with devastating force. There was some alarm in Washington. It might possibly turn more to the northward and its center might come up Chesapeake Bay or up the Potomac River. A violent storm in Washington at that time would have been detrimental to the prosecution of war plans. In 1933, a smaller hurricane had taken this course and its destructive visit to the Bay region and the Capital had not been forgotten. Also, in the minds of the military was the opportunity offered that day to explore a big hurricane and find out more concerning its inner workings.

On that critical morning, Colonel F. B. Wood, a veteran flyer in the Air Corps, came down to Bolling Field outside Washington with hurricane-probing on his mind. After talking about it to the men around the field, he decided to try a flight at least into the outer edges of the storm as it passed to the eastward during the day. He thought about the junior officers and men being sent into these furious winds and he felt it was a good idea for one of the head men to go out and see what it was like.

Wood talked to Lieutenant Frank Record and found he was anxious to go. He grabbed the telephone and got Major Harry Wexler on the line. Harry was a Weather Bureau research official who was in the Army for the duration.

"Harry, how about taking you out in the hurricane today?" Wood asked. "I'll pilot the plane. Frank is going along."

"Sure you can take me out, but you've got to bring me back," Harry answered. "This is a round trip, Floyd, I hope." Wood agreed to do his best to make a round trip out of it.

At two o'clock that afternoon, the trio took off and headed east with some misgivings. They knew that this was one of the worst tropical storms that had been charted up to that time. The hurricane was then centered near Cape Henry, Virginia. The wind at Norfolk had been up to ninety miles an hour. Colonel Wood described it as follows:

"Immediately after take-off, we penetrated a thin overcast, the top of which was about fifteen hundred feet, and then proceeded to a point approximately twenty miles northeast of Langley Field. The boundary of the hurricane, as seen from the latter location, was a dense black wall running along the western edge of the Chesapeake Bay. The airplane was turned on a heading so as to fly a track that would lead straight toward the estimated position of the center of the hurricane. Altitude was three thousand feet. A drift correction of 30° was allowed to account for the estimated one hundred miles per hour cross wind encountered at the outer edge of the storm. Immediately on entering the outer edge, the atmosphere turned very dark and a blanket of heavy rainfall was encountered."

Very surprisingly, the flyers reported that in this area a strong but steady down-current was also encountered. The latter was contrary to the accepted idea that all of the area encompassed by the steep pressure fall in a hurricane contains ascending rather than descending air up to great heights. Although visibility was very low, due to the heavy rainfall, there were very few clouds below the altitude of the airplane (three thousand feet), except for some scud over Cape Henry.

The waves in Chesapeake Bay were enormous. A freighter plowing through the Bay was being swept from bow to stern by huge waves which at times appeared to engulf the whole vessel at once. Spray was being thrown into the air at heights which appeared to reach two hundred feet above the surface of the Bay. From the appearance of the water, both within Chesapeake Bay and east of Cape Henry, it is not surprising that a Navy destroyer of the 1850-ton class was sunk there. One of the foremost thoughts in the men's minds at the time was that should the aircraft be forced down in the hurricane, neither life rafts, "Mae Wests," or any other lifesaving device would have saved them from drowning!

The flight was continued on toward the assumed position of the center of the hurricane. Although the downdraft continued strong, very little turbulence was encountered. The airplane lost a speed of about seventy miles per hour in the necessary climb required to make up for the downward motion of the air. The heavy rain continued. At a point approximately fifty to sixty miles inward from the outer edge of the hurricane, they suddenly entered an area of rising air. This area also contained fairly dense clouds below, but very thin clouds above. The sun was visible through the thin clouds overhead. They seemed to be on the edge of the center. The vertical air movement was of such magnitude that the airplane was lifted from the three thousand foot level to five thousand feet before power could be reduced and the airplane nosed downward. Turbulence in this area was also considerably more severe than in the zone of descending air just passed through, but was not of such severity as to endanger the flight.

Although the flight was continued for a few minutes on toward the point where the center of the hurricane was thought to be, the conditions of flight remained constant; that is, moderate turbulence, rising air, and the sun faintly visible through the thin clouds overhead. The men thought they were off to one side or other of the center, but not finding it, and not knowing the direction in which to fly to locate it exactly, the airplane was turned around and flown on a track which was estimated would lead toward Norfolk. An altitude of five thousand feet was maintained on the way out. The dark band of descending air and heavy rainfall was traversed in the reverse order as during the incoming flight. They emerged from the hurricane at a point approximately thirty miles east-northeast of Norfolk.

Afterward, Colonel Wood felt more confident about junior officers flying into hurricanes, but there were many questions yet to be answered. Incidentally, the three men in this plane and the members of the squadron who flew into the same hurricane from Miami were awarded the Air Medal in February, 1945, for their bravery in these flights.

Colonel Wood drew the following conclusions:

"Although one of the more important points indicated by our experience during the aforementioned flight is that hurricanes can very probably be successfully flown through after they have reached temperate latitudes, it should not be accepted as conclusive proof that all hurricanes may be flown through. Although there have been several instances of flights into hurricanes before they migrated out of the tropical regions, it is not known whether, at the times the flights were made, any of these storms were of an intensity that even approached the maximum possible. Further, it is not known for certain whether the hurricane that passed along the Virginia coast on the fourteenth of September is typical of all hurricanes once they reach temperate latitudes. Indications are that this hurricane was about as severe as they ever get to be at these latitudes, but insufficient flying experience in hurricanes has been obtained to determine conclusively that all hurricanes in temperate latitudes are safe to fly through. Any pilot who in the future might desire to repeat the experience referred to in this statement is advised that any hurricane should be approached gingerly and with a view toward making an immediate 180° change in his track, should severe turbulence, hail, or severe thunderstorm activity be encountered.

"It is believed that the method of examining a hurricane by flight reconnaissance that would produce the most revealing results is to attempt an approach to it from the stratosphere. It is thought, further, that such a flight could be made over the outer rim of the hurricane and a let-down into the center or hollow eye of the storm be made with complete safety. A record of the temperature at various flight levels while descending through the central (hollow) portion of the storm, together with photographs of the cloud structure, would be of tremendous value."

In October there was another hurricane in Florida. It began in the western Caribbean on the thirteenth and crossed western Cuba on the seventeenth. On the south coast the hurricane winds created an enormous tide. More than three hundred people were killed, and a Standard Oil Company barge was carried ten miles inland. When the big winds roared across Florida on the eighteenth and nineteenth, it was a severe storm with a calm center that was at one time about seventy miles long.

As it drove violent winds and seas toward Florida, an airline company, Transcontinental & Western Air, decided to investigate and sent an experienced pilot, Captain Robert Buck, in a B-17, to fly through and observe the weather and electrical phenomena in the storm. Of course, he considered the flight hazardous but he was willing. Any person who had experienced the violent winds of these storms or read about their destructive effects was likely to assume that a plane at low levels in the middle part of the storm might have its wings torn off.

Buck started to climb into the edge of the storm at Alma, Georgia, going in warily at four thousand feet and finding only light to moderate turbulence from there to nine thousand feet, after which it became smoother. This was in accordance with the reports of other fliers who had ventured in at high levels, and he was reassured.