NOAA 42 on tarmac in Townsville
(photo by Robert Brook)
On February 20, 1979, a NOAA hurricane hunter aircraft, NOAA42, landed in Townsville, Queensland, Australia, as part of a scientific and public outreach tour. The aircraft and crew were on a return leg from participating in the First GARP* Global Experiment in the southern Indian Ocean and were joined in Australia by several HRD (then National Hurricane Research Laboratory) scientists. The plane remained in Australia for a month and carried out research flights into Tropical Cyclones Kerry and Rosa, as well as cloud physics missions in northern Australia.
Australian citizens tour NOAA 42
(photo by Robert Brook)
The tour was to promote a close working relationship between American and Australian meteorologists and to persuade the Australian government to participate in Project STORMFURY to test the hypothesis that seeding tropical cyclones with silver iodide would lessen the storm’s winds. Although no agreement was reached about STORMFURY, the tour did engender greater interaction between the two tropical weather communities that continues to this day.
*GARP = Global Atmospheric Research Project
Greg Holland and Jack McGowan at Townsville Met Office
(photo by Robert Brook)