North Atlantic weather war
Encyclopedia
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
. The allies
Allies of World War II
The Allies of World War II were the countries that opposed the Axis powers during the Second World War . Former Axis states contributing to the Allied victory are not considered Allied states...
(Britain in particular) and Germany vied for access to reliable weather data in the North Atlantic
Atlantic Ocean
The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's oceanic divisions. With a total area of about , it covers approximately 20% of the Earth's surface and about 26% of its water surface area...
and Arctic Ocean
Arctic Ocean
The Arctic Ocean, located in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Arctic north polar region, is the smallest and shallowest of the world's five major oceanic divisions...
s and sought to deny the other weather information. Meteorological data was important as it affected military planning and the routing of ships and convoys. In various circumstances, good visibility was necessary (photographic reconnaissance and bombing raids) and in others it wasn't (keeping ship movements secret or suppressing enemy air activity). D-day planning was greatly affected by weather forecasting
Weather forecasting
Weather forecasting is the application of science and technology to predict the state of the atmosphere for a given location. Human beings have attempted to predict the weather informally for millennia, and formally since the nineteenth century...
; it was delayed by one day in the expectation that a storm would blow out and sea conditions would be acceptable. British sources of data included ships at sea and the weather station at Valentia Observatory and Blacksod Point, in neutral
Neutrality (international relations)
A neutral power in a particular war is a sovereign state which declares itself to be neutral towards the belligerents. A non-belligerent state does not need to be neutral. The rights and duties of a neutral power are defined in Sections 5 and 13 of the Hague Convention of 1907...
Ireland. German use of weather ship
Weather ship
A weather ship was a ship stationed in the ocean as a platform for surface and upper air meteorological observations for use in weather forecasting. They were primarily located in the north Atlantic and north Pacific oceans, reporting via radio...
s also exposed their secret Enigma
Enigma machine
An Enigma machine is any of a family of related electro-mechanical rotor cipher machines used for the encryption and decryption of secret messages. Enigma was invented by German engineer Arthur Scherbius at the end of World War I...
codes.
Ocean weather vessels
Starting in 1939, United States Coast GuardUnited States Coast Guard
The United States Coast Guard is a branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven U.S. uniformed services. The Coast Guard is a maritime, military, multi-mission service unique among the military branches for having a maritime law enforcement mission and a federal regulatory agency...
vessels were being used as weather ships to protect transatlantic air commerce. The Atlantic Weather Observation Service was authorized by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt on January 25, 1940. The Germans
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
began to use weather ships by the summer of 1940. However, three of its four ships were sunk by November 23, which led to the use of fishing vessels for its weather ship fleet. Their weather ships were out to sea for three to five weeks at a time. Weather observations from the Germans were cipher
Cipher
In cryptography, a cipher is an algorithm for performing encryption or decryption — a series of well-defined steps that can be followed as a procedure. An alternative, less common term is encipherment. In non-technical usage, a “cipher” is the same thing as a “code”; however, the concepts...
ed using their Enigma machine
Enigma machine
An Enigma machine is any of a family of related electro-mechanical rotor cipher machines used for the encryption and decryption of secret messages. Enigma was invented by German engineer Arthur Scherbius at the end of World War I...
s. By February 1941, five 327-foot Coast Guard cutters were used in weather patrol, usually deployed for three weeks at a time, then sent back to port for ten days. As World War II continued, cutters were needed for the war effort and by August 1942, six cargo vessels
Cargo ship
A cargo ship or freighter is any sort of ship or vessel that carries cargo, goods, and materials from one port to another. Thousands of cargo carriers ply the world's seas and oceans each year; they handle the bulk of international trade...
were used. The ships were defenseless during the war, which led to the loss of the USCGC Muskeget (WAG-48)
USS Muskeget (AG-48)
USS Muskeget – later known as USCGC Muskeget – was a commercial cargo ship acquired by the U.S. Navy during World War II. She was outfitted with a variety of guns and depth charge devices and sent on weather patrol in the North Atlantic Ocean...
with 121 aboard on September 9, 1942. In 1943, the United States Weather Bureau recognized their observations as "indispensable" during the war effort.
The Munchen and Lauenberg
German weather ship Lauenburg
The Lauenburg was a German weather ship used in the early years of the Second World War to provide weather reports for German shipping, particularly German U-boats...
were boarded by the Royal Navy
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...
, who managed to gather valuable information in each case. The Wuppertal became trapped in ice and was lost without trace of ship or crew. The flying of fighter planes between North America
North America
North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...
, Greenland
Greenland
Greenland is an autonomous country within the Kingdom of Denmark, located between the Arctic and Atlantic Oceans, east of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. Though physiographically a part of the continent of North America, Greenland has been politically and culturally associated with Europe for...
, and Iceland
Iceland
Iceland , described as the Republic of Iceland, is a Nordic and European island country in the North Atlantic Ocean, on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. Iceland also refers to the main island of the country, which contains almost all the population and almost all the land area. The country has a population...
led to the deployment of two more weather ships in 1943 and 1944. Great Britain
Great Britain
Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...
established one of their own 80 kilometres (49.7 mi) off their west coast. By May 1945, 16 ships were in use north of the 15th parallel north
15th parallel north
The 15th parallel north is a circle of latitude that is 15 degrees north of the Earth's equatorial plane. It crosses Africa, Asia, the Indian Ocean, the Pacific Ocean, Central America, the Caribbean and the Atlantic Ocean....
in the Atlantic, with six more in the tropical Atlantic. A total of 20 United States Navy
United States Navy
The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...
frigates were used across the Pacific for similar operations. Weather Bureau personnel stationed on weather ships were asked voluntarily to accept the assignment. In addition to surface weather observation
Surface weather observation
Surface weather observations are the fundamental data used for safety as well as climatological reasons to forecast weather and issue warnings worldwide. They can be taken manually, by a weather observer, by computer through the use of automated weather stations, or in a hybrid scheme using...
s, the weather ships would launch radiosonde
Radiosonde
A radiosonde is a unit for use in weather balloons that measures various atmospheric parameters and transmits them to a fixed receiver. Radiosondes may operate at a radio frequency of 403 MHz or 1680 MHz and both types may be adjusted slightly higher or lower as required...
s and pilot balloons, or PIBALs, to determine weather conditions aloft. Due to its value, operations continued after World War II ended, which led to an international agreement in September 1946 that no fewer than 13 ocean weather stations would be maintained by the Coast Guard, with five others maintained by Great Britain and two by Brazil
Brazil
Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...
.
Land stations
There were attempts to set up land based weather stations in contested locations such as SpitsbergenSpitsbergen
Spitsbergen is the largest and only permanently populated island of the Svalbard archipelago in Norway. Constituting the western-most bulk of the archipelago, it borders the Arctic Ocean, the Norwegian Sea and the Greenland Sea...
, and even on Allied-held shores, such as Weather Station Kurt
Weather Station Kurt
Weather Station Kurt was an Automatic weather station, erected by a German U-boat crew in Northern Labrador, Newfoundland in October 1943. This was the only armed German military operation on land in North America during the Second World War.-Background:Weather in the Northern Hemisphere...
in Labrador
Labrador
Labrador is the distinct, northerly region of the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador. It comprises the mainland portion of the province, separated from the island of Newfoundland by the Strait of Belle Isle...
. The Germans were obliged, by their continental location, to rely largely on long-range aircraft and weather ships, which were vulnerable to attack, and clandestine teams in exposed locations. The Allies had a distinct advantage in the contest, holding all of the major land areas (Newfoundland, Greenland, Iceland) of the North Atlantic. As weather patterns at that latitude generally travel west to east, the Allies could follow the progress of a front as it traveled across the Atlantic. The Germans, with their small number of (impermanent) observation stations, had to rely on a certain amount of luck to detect a weather front
Weather front
A weather front is a boundary separating two masses of air of different densities, and is the principal cause of meteorological phenomena. In surface weather analyses, fronts are depicted using various colored lines and symbols, depending on the type of front...
before it reached Europe.
In August 1941, in the preparation for Operation Gauntlet
Operation Gauntlet
During World War II, Operation Gauntlet was a Combined Operations raid by Canadian troops, with British Army logistics support and Free Norwegian Forces servicemen on the Norwegian island of Spitsbergen, 600 miles south of the North Pole, from 18 August 1941....
, the Royal Navy destroyed the weather station on Bear Island and, later, the one on Spitsbergen
Spitsbergen
Spitsbergen is the largest and only permanently populated island of the Svalbard archipelago in Norway. Constituting the western-most bulk of the archipelago, it borders the Arctic Ocean, the Norwegian Sea and the Greenland Sea...
(after it had transmitted false information to discourage air observation). Spitsbergen was an important location, however, as it enabled the Germans to monitor weather conditions on the convoy route to northern Russia. The Germans made several attempts to establish and maintain weather reports from the Svalbard
Svalbard
Svalbard is an archipelago in the Arctic, constituting the northernmost part of Norway. It is located north of mainland Europe, midway between mainland Norway and the North Pole. The group of islands range from 74° to 81° north latitude , and from 10° to 35° east longitude. Spitsbergen is the...
archipelago including Spitsbergen and Hopen
Hopen
Hopen is an island in the southeastern part of the Svalbard archipelago . Hopen was discovered in 1613, probably by Thomas Marmaduke of Hull, who named it after his former command, the Hopewell....
(Hope Island) and these were never successfully suppressed. Other locations used were on Jan Mayen Island and eastern Greenland
Greenland
Greenland is an autonomous country within the Kingdom of Denmark, located between the Arctic and Atlantic Oceans, east of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. Though physiographically a part of the continent of North America, Greenland has been politically and culturally associated with Europe for...
with teams and automated stations.
Further reading
- Weather War, Cdr. Carl O. Schuster, USN (This link is dead, 15 March 2010)
- Kington, John. Wekusta: Luftwaffe Weather Reconnaissance Units in World War Two (Flight Recorder Publications Ltd, 2006).