Almost 10 years ago, the Oklahoma Wing scheduled search and rescue exercises on a weekend that local television weathercasters predicted would present clear skies. Maj. Gerald Creager had examined weather data, though, believed the day would play out differently.
“I notified mission management that I didn’t think it was going to be great weather, and I was overruled because the TV station said it was going to be good weather,” Creager remembered. “We had everyone assemble — and it was a huge turnout — and we were fogged in with icy conditions.
“By the end of Saturday, we had to release everybody.”
Since then, CAP officials have given Creager’s weather predictions more credence. When bad weather bears down, Civil Air Patrol’s modest but mighty Weather Support Team is a linchpin for safe operations.
As the 2024 hurricane season begins, the team urgently needs reinforcements. The two-member team —Creager and Lt. Col. Darrin Lunsford of the Florida Wing’s Eglin Composite Squadron — provides weather intelligence and forecasting for incident commanders and planners during major storms and other operations.
The team was born out of necessity after several weather-related mishaps during training exercises prompted a CAP member with a deep meteorology background to start providing forecasts — Creager, a computational scientist at the National Severe Storms Laboratory.
“After terminating a couple of exercises due to inaccurate weather predictions from TV meteorologists, I was asked to start providing forecasts a week prior to the exercises,” said Creager, who in recent years relocated from Oklahoma to Colorado Springs. He serves as CAP’s deputy senior program manager for health services nationally and as the health services officer for the Southwest Region.
During Hurricane Harvey in 2017, Creager was assigned to support flight operations from the San Marcos, Texas, airport, where CAP was staging most aircraft to support the mission. Lt. Col. Eric Templeton was assigned to run operations out of San Marcos and received weather updates from Creager in real time.
After leaving the San Marcos operation, Creager continued to provide weather updates to support the mission and subsequently provided weather support for numerous hurricanes and storms across the Gulf and East coasts from 2017-2022.
In 2018, he was invited to give daily weather briefings during the National Emergency Services Academy, thus formally establishing weather support for the Virtual Incident Management Team.
The last several seasons were incredibly active, with Creager conducting nightly teleconferences from June through October and sometimes multiple calls per day during active storms to issue forecasts.
“It’s a lot of work, and my wife is getting tired of it,” Creager said. “I need others with formal meteorology training to help share the load.”
The team uses U.S. Air Force Weather Agency resources and receive support from the 557th Weather Wing for missions.
Its severe weather criteria align more with the Air Force’s focus on aircraft and personnel safety, while the National Weather Service prioritizes damage to structures and casualties.
Creager has modified Air Force Weather Agency tools to match CAP flight regulations and provide data for commanders and planners.
The team doesn’t provide pilot weather briefings but may assist pilots in locating weather data as needed. Most of its involvement occurs online, including participating in virtual incident management teams for major incidents that allow it to collaborate with the best teams and train personnel to meet CAP and Federal Emergency Management Agency standards.
To provide sufficient coverage, Creager estimates the team needs eight to 10 members with partial or full meteorology degrees or backgrounds. He’s specifically seeking:
Members with a meteorology degree or a certificate in meteorology from an accredited college or university, and operational forecasting experience.
Retired or prior-service U.S. Air Force/military weather officers and enlisted personnel certified at AFCS 1WX05 or higher.
Broadcast meteorologists with certificates from the American Meteorological Society or National Weather Association.
The ideal candidates would understand operational meteorology and be able to synthesize weather model data into coherent forecasts and briefings tailored for aviation, ground operations, and command staff.
“We can’t undertake training members from scratch in meteorology,” Creager stressed.
The time commitment would vary based on storm activity.
The overall commitment to support a storm response begins before the storm arrives and continues as long as operations are ongoing, which could last for weeks. The intent is to have enough members to spread out the forecasting and virtual incident management team duties, so no one is overloaded.
The forecasting workload may be intense, especially when trying to predict the arrival of a tropical cyclone. With sufficient personnel, though, the workload should be more manageable.
“The goal is for no one to be overwhelmed,” Creager said. “If we have enough people, we can rotate operational periods where one person may only need to be on-call for a few days at a time. And someone can fill in if necessary.”
For Creager, this labor of love extends back to his beginnings at CAP in 2013. An experienced pilot, Gerry joined CAP after a wide-ranging career that included medical research, computational science, and numerical weather prediction modeling. He was drawn to work at the Severe Storms Lab in 2012 to focus on high-performance computing for weather.
Now officially retired but staying busy, Creager wants to pay it forward by developing cadet training materials derived from Air Force weather courses.
“My dream is to create a program where our cadets can get certified in the same training as enlisted airmen,” he said. “We could potentially get them credits so if they join the Air Force, they could move up faster.”
But first, Creager needs to build up the Weather Support Team to a sustainable level. As the peak hurricane period looms, he’s watching weather conditions closely — especially worrisome ocean temperatures in the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico and along the East Coast.
“The setup reminds me of Hurricane Katrina,” said Creager, who fears the 2024 forecast — 23 tropical cyclones and 11 named storms — could severely test CAP’s resources.
By expanding the Weather Support Team, Creager hopes CAP can maintain its aerial services through any scenarios that develop. All it will take is a few more members who can help shoulder the burden of delivering pinpoint weather intelligence.
Those interested in joining the team can contact Creager at [email protected]._____Anne SaitaContributing Writer
