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Video by Senior Airman Courtney Sebastianelli

Combat Weather Mission-Set

93rd Air Ground Operations Wing

Feb. 13, 2024 | 2:07

This video details the full spectrum of the U.S. Air Force's Combat Weather career field.

- TRANSCRIPT -

Combat Weather Airmen reduce the fog of war through operationalizing weather forecasting and analysis.

Understanding the full spectrum of weather impacts goes beyond the physical limitations of the environment, it affects how friendly and adversarial forces conduct operations on the battlefield.

Effective weather analysis contributes to military decision-making processes and provides critical information for intelligence elements to estimate red-force courses of action and when to consolidate blue-force combat power to achieve battlefield success.

Staff Weather Officers, known as SWOs, utilize an array of environmental sensing equipment to increase battlefield situational awareness. Weather tools enable SWOs to develop forecasts and analyze weather data.

This empowers them to support accurate artillery fire, protect assets from weather impacts, enhance chemical threat response, and enable the employment of aircraft, small unmanned aerial systems, and tactical military vehicles.

Providing this weather data from the forward edge of the battlespace places SWOs directly in harm’s way. This reality drives Combat Weather Airmen to train to ensure they are as effective on the battlefield as they are at their weather specialties.

They will become proficient in the application of combat arms, airborne and air assault specialties, and sharpen the tactical skills every warfighter needs to protect themselves and their brothers and sisters on the battlefield.

Combat Weather Airmen constantly look to expand the battlefield applications of weather through innovations in how we perceive our operating environments and where we can best utilize accurate, real-time weather data from the front lines.

This outlook will contribute to expanded weather options for air and ground forces. Battlefield commanders utilize these weather inputs to exploit environmental conditions and increase success in high-threat contingency environments.

Combat weather provides a greater understanding of the factors impacting the front lines of military conflicts.