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multibeam echo sounders to check for any submerged hazards to navigation resulting from the storm.
NOAA is a science-based federal agency within the Department of Commerce with regulatory, operational, information service and public safety responsibilities. The NOAA Commissioned Officer Corps is one of the seven U.S. uniformed services. They command the NOAA ships and pilot the NOAA aircraft that play a vital role in the acquisition and analysis of environmental data needed to meet national security, economic and environmental challenges.
A Century of Service
Faced with tough national security and economic challenges and a natural world governed by powerful and mysterious forces that often threatened life, property and commerce, President Thomas Jefferson signed a bill creating a new federal agency in 1807 that would support the nation’s defense, promote the well-being of its citizens and unlock nature’s secrets. The new agency’s mission was to chart the nation’s coastal waters to ensure that ships could move civilians, troops and material safely.
During the next 150 years, that agency – the Survey of the Coast and later the Coast & Geodetic Survey (C&GS) – would prove itself in war as well as in peacetime. With America’s entry into World War I, a commissioned service of the C&GS was formed on May 22, 1917, to ensure the rapid assimilation of C&GS technical skills for defense purposes. During World War II, officers and civilians of the C&GS produced nautical and aeronautical charts, provided critical geospatial information to artillery units and conducted reconnaissance surveys.
Eventually the organization became known as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and today NOAA and the NOAA Commissioned Officer Corps, one of the lesser known of the U.S.’s seven uniformed
services, conduct the work of the C&GS and more. The direct descendants of the C&GS, NOAA and the NOAA Corps work every day on land, in the air and on the sea to keep the nation secure and productive by providing products and services that support maritime domain awareness; help ensure safe passage of commercial and military traffic on our nation’s waterways; warn mariners, aviators and the public of severe weather; aid search and rescue efforts; and conserve and protect our natural resources.
NOAA is comprised of the National Weather Service; National Marine Fisheries Service; Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research; National Environmental Satellite, Data and Information Service; National Ocean Service; and the Office of Marine and Aviation Operations. For the past 100 years, the NOAA Corps officers have commanded NOAA’s fleet of research and survey vessels and aircraft, and they serve within each of the above NOAA line offices.
NOAA’s Aircraft Fleet
NOAA has conducted airborne environmental data gathering missions for more than four decades. A fleet of nine manned aircraft is operated, managed and maintained at NOAA’s Aircraft Operations Center (AOC), part of NOAA’s Office of Marine and Aviation Operations.
In June, the AOC moved from MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Florida, into a new facility at Lakeland (Florida) Linder Regional Airport that serves as the main base for the aircraft fleet. The AOC has a 58,000-square- foot aircraft hangar, office space and facilities for aircraft repairs and component storage.
Cmdr. Mark Sweeney, deputy director of the National Geodetic Survey’s Remote Sensing Division within the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, with the 2009 Beechcraft King Air 350CER. The bubble window is one of several mods made to the airplane.
AUGUST 2017
KING AIR MAGAZINE • 3