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SAMUEL PROCTOR ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM at
the University of Florida.
RED 10
Date: January 26, 1967
Subject: Dunn (Weather
Interviewer: Polly Redond
Transcriber: Sharon Harrington
SIDE I
R: Mid-forties and at the midpoint would be approximate somewhere
around 1950.
D: 1950.
R: So that then presumably 1950 to 1960 might be.
D: Well, until really 1970 or perhaps even at the most 1975 ah, we
C-
should be cooler than normal. Now, I think it was last year, not this
December but the December 1965 iJ was the first time in seven
years that we hadrAt had a December above normal in temperature. Now,
another indicator of the fact that our temperatures have been running
lower than normal and this is particularly true in the winter time
or at least you notice it more in the winter time, ah, yae should have
a frost in Dade County only about every other year but I came down
here in 1955 and this year, this winter, tey haven't had a frost
yet in Dade County although we, somebody from Carol City one morning,
coldest morning did report a thin film of frost on his automobile,
but nevertheless, so far this winter there has been no frost damage
to truck in Dade County but, of course, the winter isn't over yet,
but ah, we normally don't have a frost after the first of March so
that we really have a month to go. This will be the first winter
since I have been down here that we haven't had a, the damaging
frost in Dade County.
R: And you say that we usually have one...
D: On the average we should have one only ah, every other winter.
2
R: Every other winter and we've had them every winter since, ah.
D: Well, except this winter and this winter isn't over yet.
R: Yes, but, what, last winter was a warm winter too, we had one
bad spell.
D: We had one bad spell and .... yeah.
R: And after that it was... cause this has been most unseasonal, this,
this year.
D: Yes, that's right, that is ah, last winter and of course, this
winter is warm, although December did average a degree and a half below
normal but, this is averaging much above, more above normal than
December averaged below normal so that it does appear unless there's
a, a radical change right away, 4a--isn t indicated by anything yet, ah,
that this will be a warm winter. Last year was a warm winter but, ah,
most of the other winters since I've been down here with one exception'-
was the winter that we were in Pakistan, and didn't see ah have been
below normal.
R: Yeah. Well, do you personally iae this Bpokner cycle, so called,
are you personally convinced of it or, do you believe in them, so to
speak, or you v -2t
D: Well urp, I'm a mild believer in it, ah, but, ah, the head, the
chief of the office of climatology at the weather bureau, Dr.
Lansburg, a, -ye+ ah, ranks as a conservative, a strong conservative
in these matters is a non-believer in it. He just recently retired, j
during the last couple months and his successor has been appointed,
but um, a Dr. Bleaka, who is head of the Netherlands Meteorlogical
Service and is the, one of the world's recognized climatologists)
does believe in it and ah, I'm a mild believer in it because it
3
seems to fit in with what I have observed where ever I have been
located ah, in my meteorological lifetime.
R: Well, so and then, so the Bookner -Cycle so to speak, so that's
twenty good years or twenty hot years...
D: That's somewhere between twenty and twenty-five.
R: All right between twenty and twenty-five hot years to oversimplify,
and then followed by twenty or twenty-five cool years.
D: Yeta, yes.
-7
R: And how about in the midpoint, is there sort of a lapse in
between?
D: Well, there a, normally there appears to be a gradual change
over, sometimes it 's abrupt, sometimes it's ah, ah, you'll have
a period of ah, five years or so that, every other year, one
year it's cold and the next year it's below, above and so forth.
R: At-lese4, if I remember correctlyvwhen the sun spots were so,
everybody was talking about the sun spots, at one time they were
very stylish and I remember the sun spots cycle was, I believe,
eleven years wasn't it?
D: Yes, but, there's different sun spot cycles.
R: Well, I know they're superimposed.
D: Yes, and of course the same thing is, appears to be true of,
at least these cycle Pei4e4, you might say, these cycles are
superimposed on each other and so that actually you may have one
warm cycle that's superimposed on another cold cycle, balance
each other out and then on another case you may have two cold
cycles that are superimposed on each other and should give you
a stronger -colder-'1 cycle than you would get otherwise, but,
4
its ah, lets say, this is confused and indefinite and meteorologists
by and large are pretty much -he 0- v .
R: Well, you have to have something to pep up the profession, you
couldn't, you have to have to have something to argue about, wouldn't
be any fun. Um,...
D: There was a former 4& director of the Smithsonian, \4 yv Ebetr
He is, at least in the United States, has been the strongest advocate
of ah, weather cycles.
R: Let me ask you, you're reaching you're getting beyond the
threshold of something that the layman can understand, this is obviously
a professional, intra-professional...
D: You might say they don't understand it.
R: ...controversies that are always so much fun when you're in it,
but, let me ask you one thing, there's all this talk about controlling
of hurricanes, now, I'm sure this is a lousy journalistic question
that you're tired of answering, but, ah, my first question would be,
do you think that, that its possible that some of these techniques,
such as the silver iodide or some of the others will, well, it
won't, would not abolish them entirely but that they could be, in
some measure modified, do you think that might work or?
D: Not within the foreseeable future, that is ah, what little we
have been able to do in the way of experimentation ah, what little
we've been able to do would indicate that ah, nothing is likely to
come out of this in the way -,- of control or modification for at
least another decade. I would hesitate to say what man may or may
not be able to do, twenty-five, fifty years from now.
5
R: Yeah.
D: But, um, there's no indication that we will be able to exercise
any, anything in the way of controlswithin the coming decade.
R: Well, this is just, this question is just a set-up for my next
one, which is really a dirty one, and that is lets assume that yeu
were able to control hurricanes or modify them to such an extent
that what would have been a major hurricane would end up only as
a strong easternly way, in other words, instead of like, winds of
over seventy miles an hour or winds of a hundred and fifty and
two hundred miles an hour that we would still get something that
was maybe only seventy or sixty miles and hour and instead of
ten inches of rainfall we'd only get like four, you know, con-
S4 siderably as tamel them, eame4 them down 1all right. Now, if
SihtErue that hurtAsmo ify) the extremes, which it must be,
and if it is true then that the extremes modify the environment
without sounding too f 4- about the whole thing, might
it-not be possible that hurricanes being in one kind of way an
extreme/7that we have here in South Florida, could you even venture a
guess, a wild cat horse bat guess if hurricanes would disappear would
there be any real changes here, or is that just too awkward?
D: I'm going to give you ah, two answers to this, or perhaps ah,
answers i-two viewpoints. Oye is that a hurricane appears to come
about as a result of excess energy..a in the tropics, by that we
mean excess heat. Now, nature strives and is quite successful at
not exactly neutralizing but, ah, through.. the mixing of the warm air
in the tropics and the cold air ai-the poles in the temperate zones
through these .ic, storms of a, mixing a deficiency of ex-, energy in one
6
place and excessie energy in another, but, it isn't always able to do
so and that when you get this excess of temperature in the tropics
ah, eventually you'll bring about the development of a hurricane.
Now, if nature was not able to handle this in this way it certainly
would have to do it in some other way, because you can not build up
a concentration of energy in a certain restricted area without
something happening ah, ...
R: Something's got to give.
D: It's got to give in some way, so that ah, one might ask the
question, wee-nature's way of handling this situation ah, might
possibly be worse, might be more destructive, ah, thn hurricanee.1 (*
R: Well, lets say, is it, is it a build-up of excess in a little
tiny area that makes this 0D tor?
D: Well, ah, it probably is not in a little tiny area, its over a
fairly broad area ah, but, over this broad area it/starts to try to
work this out in a certain way which leads to an increase in shower
activity.ab
activity, aI as this moisture rises, more moist air .rises from the
surface and then you get this condensationrThrough this process of
condensation you release latent heat ah, well, again heat is energy
and that's just adding more energy 4ell, ah, whenever you have this
process going on that tends to start a circulation and to draw this
energy which is over a wide area to concentrate it in a smaller
area and then eventually will lead to the development os of a
hurricaneo,.but, initially, a&b over a wide area this process starts,
butras soon as you begin to get a circulation, the stuff draws to
a central point in the circulation and then you get your concentration.
7
R: And then once you get the system of the big funnel whaF in the
circular pattern then it tends to continue?
D: Yesd$Tihat is ah, once this process is started it grows on itself and
on its environment and continues this concentration of energya6wdhen
it is moved along by the current in which it is embedded) and then
usually tp- this s, finds a weakness in th tradewinds ah, to the
",North and is able to recurve northward and then takes all of this into
this cooler air in the tempera zone and then completes,4-v process
of mixing)and astr eventually achieves its purpose.
R: Oh, I see, so -t s oversimplified, if you've got this hot spot,
so to speak, this hot spot, this hot wet spot, it starts up a kind of
a, a shi-e, a spout, so to speak, and it pulls it out of the tropics
and dumps it up in the porth, ah, well almost as if you, well I use the
housewife's thing, as if you hdd a bad spot in a bowl of soup and you
simply lifted it out and plucked it out and threw it some place else.
D: You see what normally happens...
R: But then there'd be no, even the wildest guess couldn't explain
what would then happen if these were -9kcl -
D: Yes, no one has any idea just how nature would e&accomplishe4 this.
Now, you see, what happens normally, again getting back to the areas of
high pressure over the oceans ah, the Azores, Bermuda anti-cyclone or
high pressure area and then we have a similar one in the Pacific, in this
circulation ah, this warm moist air which is accumulated in the tropics
ah, around the left side is normally carried and of course this is
in the area of Florida and the eastern United States in summer and then
over South-east Asia as the other place. In other words, there are
8
two main channels to get this northward into the tempera zone. That
is one, the eastern United States and the extreme nearhwestern Atlantic
and then the similar area over near the Asiatic coast, ah, now, ah,
this requires say, a tropical pressure in these areas to do this.
R: Well, the low pressure would be the line of sort of the least
resistance so that it would slip, tend to slip up...
D: Now, at times, you get as again, a general circulation set-up
so that we don't have this tropical pressure over here and ah, it
can't funnel this warm moist air up into the .a, t pera zone and
that's when we get this accumulation and ah, that's when we get this
hurricane.
R: The hurricanesgnd then what, the way that a hurricane goes
depends on what your pressure system is at the time, I mean like,Tor
this-4 if it happens to be on a June 5th, it just depends whosia.
a 6 "o Y
where your high pressure is at that time it will bounce up q 0 -Y
A
D: find the weakness in this circulation. Now, the second
factor I wanted to mention is; that in certain areas, the precipitation
produced by these hurricanes and tropical disturbances ar. is a
major factor in their total precipitation now, last night at home,
I was reading in the Phillipine Islands I can't believe they're
right, but/this is what they say that its between sixty and sixty-
five percent of their annual precipitation. Now, gai water again
is their resource and -ea particularly true where say they need
irrigationaba-aad particularly say in India, where this is so
important as far as their food crop is concerned, h-t-the.TFhey're
9
concerned that if we eliminated these things that -that would have a
serious affect. Now, for example, even in the United States, fifty
percent of tropical storms do more good than they do harm.
R: Oh really, now, that's never come out.in all the talk that they
always, when ever the hurricane comes they interview you'til hell won't
have it and I've never heard it said.
D: Because ah, very frequently, some where or another this thing will
encounter an area that's enjoying the drouth at the time and it breaks
the drouth.
R: Well, just like, look at New England has been saved a number of
times by the September storms that come up and were so bad up there
in Massachusetts and New Hampshire and all, and they were praying for
. a hurricane.
D: Actually, in the last couple of years they have been side-swiped,
you might say. They haven't gotten the full effects but still certain
areas, coastal areas have gotten quite a bit of relief,r.a from the
"qde" edges of these tropical storms.
R: Well, then, to what extent is that true of South Florida, that oes
our precipitation' if yet-were -, to wave the magic wand and say well
all right, no more hurricanes for twenty years, air do you think that
our water situation might,...
D: Not within the foreseeable future and now...
R: No, no, I don't mean, could we do it, but, supposing that you and
I were just able to have a magic wand right here and we could wave it
now and say well, no more hurricanes for twenty years .A- Florida, do
you think that we would change our pattern?
D: No, we don't consider the precipitation produced by tropical
storms in South Florida very significantA now, there have been years
10
when it has been as high as twelve to fifteen percent, but, ah, ...
R: That's the highest?
D: That's the highest. Ah, but, most, say on the average, ah, there's
probably no more than four or five percent, so that we don't think
lhar is important here. Now,...
R: t hen you say that most of them do more good than harm it must be
to the northern states, that it does more good than harm.
D: Well, its ah, it happens along the gulf coast.
R: Ofthe gulf coast.
D: And it happens along the Atlantic coast north of Florida.aadThen
of course, some of these go inland and they will, they can give rain
even into the Mississippi Valley and a, so forth.
R: That one last summer dumped a lot of rain on Georgia, Tennessee
and...
D: Yes, yes, in fact, abr say in Georgia and the Carolinas, Alma, well,
I would expect !t-a1 probably its value to agriculture was at least
twelve million dollars.
R: Oh, really. So, in other words, South Florida or Florida is,
lost, is Caro-, can be count, can beat the Carolinas then.
D: Yes, you see the difference is the, that here the summer is
our rainy season and the hurricanes come during our rainy season
but, you get a little farther north, but, even in the Southern states
you might say, except Florida, ah, you can have serious drouths
during the summer season, which is their growing season.
R: I see.
D: The winter is our growing season, you might say, down here.
R: So ItitT-mO that we don't care.
11
D: Yeah.
ree49~
R: Well, that's pretty interesting. I had, I had no idea that, I mean,
I knew that the hurricanes did a certain amount of good but, I don't
think, that I had no idea that it was even half of them.
D: But even Japan, for example, aim and they have been considering
this, ais that thirty pe cent of their annual precipitation comes
from tropical storms.
R: So that...
D: They're the next highest to the Philipines and that's the reason
why I think the Philipines, a;, but, ...
R: Soends like all of these schemes to control nature, its not
really, it might, it has its disadvantages.
D: But even, now, get back to Floridaai, ,if we were to consider all
disturbed conditions that go through here that have potential for
//
hurricane development and say at some time somebody decided -tat well,
we should start trying to get rid of all the potential conditions that
could lead to hurricane development all right, then I think that here
in Florida we would be getting into an area where we would be monkeying
around with a significant amount of our precipitation, perhaps as
much as fifty pe cent.
R: Um-hum. Yeah, I mean, like the big ones, but, we do have the so-
called, what we call easterly waves.
D: Yes, in disturbed conditions -a- you get an eastly wave coming through
in the summer timeak0, sometimes i- passee-south of us, but, sometimes
we're right at the northern.edge and they do significantly increase
ou4 precipitation for a day or two. They actually come through about
once every three or four days.
R: Yeah, yeah. Well, it really is interesting, its perfectly a ^A ~
12 =
and,of course, down here we're so, we're all so weather conscious. Isn't
this, but, would you,in all your, you were in Chicago at one time.
D: Yes, that's right.
R: I remember I used to come from Chicago and I remember your name,
you were there for a number of years, weren-'t you?
D: 0O,, I was in Chicago, that was my longest assingment. I was
there sixteen, seventeen years.
R: Yes, because, I can always remember your name being mentioned
about that That was long before you got into the hurricane business.
D: Yes, yes.
R: SE, were you the first of the hurricane people, because this
hasn't always been the National Hurricane Center, that's a fairly
new jobAI st T- .
D: No, that had been set up since I have been here. Now, we have these
other hurricane centers, San Juan, New Orleans, Washington and
Boston,-akr; ut, there's been a gradual evolution since I've been
here, transferring responsibility to this office.aod=aum, well,
for example, for the last two years, they've put the responsibility
on me, the whenever a hurricane is coming inland anywhere, that if
I felt that the warning, say, even to the Boston area, were a
unsatisfactory in some way, aSd I could tell them to change their
warning and they would have to do it. Now, af; beginning at last
year, we began to do actually the forecasting for New Orleans and
for San Juan.--y They still issued the advisories, but they had
to take our forecast and the+.b they would on the basis of the infor-
mation, fundamental data, they would write the advisory. Now,
beginning this year, we're going to do it for everybody& ,n other
13
words, even Boston, and we will make the computations and make
the forecasts, provide them with the fundamental data, but/ they
will write the advisory.
R: Well, in other words they do the prose and you do the calculations.
D: Yes that's right.
R: Ah, is it just then, is it no coincidence that you're on the top
of this computer center, in other words, are you directly using these
computers in this building in your uwa...
D: At the moment, we are using a4 the computers,mostly for research.
Now, as far as computations are concerned SW we are sending the
data to Washington where they have a big, theyihave a even much larger
computer than e ave hereaad then they send the results back to
us down here. Now, eventually we will probably make use of the computer
here for forecasting, but,-.5-.we're, you might say, still experimenting
with the use of computer in operational forecasting& at the moment, the
computer does almost as good but not quite as good as the human
forecaster, aB but/ at times the computer is way off and- so that we usd
it just as an aid and a tool. Now, one reason why we send this up
to Washington is that the arrangement that the university has with the
manufacturer, that they are permitted to give a very good rate, far
below, in factforty or fifty percent of what you can go out and
get this done commercially, in so far as research is done, but/ if
its operational they are required to charge what any other privately
owned computer will charge, so that...
R: I understand, because, research stuff you can stick in in the middle
of the night and you don't have to have it right away.ad. -ak
D: So that financially its much cheaper for us to send the thing up
to Washington.
14
R: Well then why, why do you believe that this was named the
National Hurricane Center since all the data has to be shipped into
Washington anyhow, for operational use& yhy did theyTD {t 7.
D: No, a lot of the data never goes beyond here ye process it and
we reduce it)atLt=. you might say to just a tape, we can send it up
in a couple of minutes, but, the 'par the processing and ter
so forth is all done here.
R: Well, how did it happen that this got here, because, you became
Mr. Hurricane)tre-what, how did that happen historically?
D: Well, historically, first we started out in 1935 with the
decentralization of hurricane forecasting because at Washington...
R: In '35 it would be too slow.
D: What's that?
R: It would of been too slow at that time.
D: Well yes, and also the fact that their energies were diverted in
so many areas that they did4-ct know-specialization. Now, take for
example, in the '26_ hurricaneThe winds reached hurricane force at
one am, the hurricane warningon Miami Beach went up at midnight, -a
and aky the wind was already blowing so strong it took two people
to raise the flag ah, and another time the forecaster in Washington,
and this was aUT in the 1930, it-gs prior to 1935. Galveston is a
very sensitive area because, they remember the 1900 hurricane when
six thousand people were drowned. They put up hurricane warfilngs
for the Galveston area aadsmah at eleven o'clock in the morning well,
the afternoon came along and weather wasn't getting any worse, and ah,-
awh they commenced to wonder, so the Chamber of Commerce sent a
telegram up to Washington, ai what is the hurricane doing,is it
still headed in this direction: and some fool up there who should of
15
known better )Sk sent back ah,7 no additional information, unable to
contact forecaster on golf course." That really raised a mess& well,
finally the pressure from this locality based on the service that they
were getting from Washington was so strong that they had to decentralize
itaaT then they arranged it so that instead of issuing warning, advi-
sories twice a day, they issued them four times a day9ye plotted maps
four times a dayV we had forecasters on duty continuously during the
hurricane seasonandft-ah Then a lot has been done since then to
improve the service. Well, in this area it was done in Jacksonville;
this was started at Jacksonvillep but7then the war came along and the
Navy put in headquarters sh, here at Miami and because of the fact that
hurricanes are just as important to the military as they are to the
civilians, they insisted that the center ah, be transferred from
Jacksonville to Miami.and so this was done, I believe in 1943. Well,
while the Army and the Navy had their own meteorological services they
have agreed that they would accept the forecast and advisories and
everything from the National Hurricane Center and they have called
it a joint operationand so ab, they have felt that Miami, being Qotrpal
centrally located in the hurricane area and also...
R: We-ie- the nearest thing to the Caribbean.
O5- of
D: Yes, that's right and from-the standpoint fesm air transportation
and from the standpoint of communications, everyone thinks that its a
logical place to put itp and hen of course, Miami was also a very
sensitive area because of its high hurricane frequency about this time,
that they thought it desirable to locate it here.
R: Well, then of course, you have your major airlines coming into here,
and so you have a great deal...
D: So that if we have to send somebody)as we often do, like, when the
16
storm was ah, coming very close to San Juan last year, Inez& we sent some
help down to Puerto Rico to help them, ah as it was passing closest to
them and then itcould get on a plane and get back here to Miami ah in
time to help us again when it was coming closer to us5, and so that aE,
it ah- works out very well, we think.
R: Yeah, well it certainly has been...
Pause in the tape and another conversation is resumed, recorded below.
D: New Orleans, San Juan, Miami, Washington, and Boston. Five.
R: Five, andkthis was only one and they were all more or less on
equal stance.
D: Yes, that's right, although Miami, even then, ah, was considered
ak; paramount, ea. because of the fact that ah, here the liaison and
a 1 t 1 Navy and the Air Force Hurricane Hunters, an4-ah,
it was all done out of Miami so Miami had, has always had, since they
moved it down here, a little pre-eminence over the other Hurricane
Centers.
R: Yeah, well, then so that it was, now, you had been in Chicago
all those years, did you come directly from Chicago to Miami?
D: Yes, that's right.
R: Well, then you did just exactly what I did, two years earlier.
D; Yes).
R: Ah, but, then how was it that you were chosen, was this just an
ordinary tour of duty or were you particularly interested in hurricanes
or how did it happen?
D: Well, even though I was in Chicago I was considered the Weather
17
Bureau's princite expert in tropical meteorology, not that anybody knows
too much about tropical meteorology because its still the most
primitive area sh: that we have, but I was Grady Norton's assistant
when they started the center in Jacksonville in '35,andt so that I
assisted him for four years ah, up until the fall of'39 when I was
transferred to Chicago.
R: Yeah.
D: Ad h hen during the war when the military decided they had
twenty thousand office to train in meteorology a4te hey weren't going
to train them all in tropical meteorology but a lot of them because of
the operations in the Pacific and atr so forth.
R: Yeah.
D: They asked the University of Chicago to start an Institute of
Tropical Meteorology in Puerto Rico, ah, which they did,ande so they
asked the Weather Bureau to lend me to them for six months or so to
help them get started down in Puerto Rico. so I went down and helped get
the Institute started down there and -az for six months participated
in the training ardThen they had me come down later on to give lectures
as they shot each group on through. Well, then a little bit later ash
the operation started in the Pacific and particularly the Air Force auh
was concerned about forecasting for B29 operations against Japan. Now,
it was their intention, originally, to bomb Japan from air bases in
China.end-ely-,so they started building five or six air bases, big air
bases in China. They had as many as a hundred thousand Chinese coolies
working on a single air field, so ah, they asked the Weather Bureau to
lend me af to them,.a to train officers in the C.B.I. region for
the B29 operations against Japan.
R: C.B.I. being China, Burma, and India.
D: All right, but, by the time I got over to India, the Japanese, of
18
course, knew what was going on, had captured every field except one.
R: Oh, oh.
D: That was at Cheng Du and that was in the foot hills of the Himalayas.
R: Ah-huh.
D: Now, they could only reach the southernmost island from Cheng Du,
because it was so far away ah4j- nd that is the reason why then they had
to start capturing these islands in the Southwest Pacific like/Guam,
and Saipan and so forthIhy.ayr but- I had gotten over there and so then
they decided that since I was over there that they would send the officers
that they were going to put into that tropical region over there ai%
to Tenth Weather Headquarters,aas which is just outside of Calcutta,
for training They'd send them there for a couple of months and then they
would relocate them somewhere else -o that I stayed there for a year.
and I forecasted for the B29 operations against Southeast Asia, that is
for example, a couple of Jap battleships would appear in Saigon Harbor
and reconnaissance planes would see it and then they'd want to go over
and try to bomb it.
R: That's where you got your iron nerves, I suppose?
D: Yeah. So I was forecast ag- in the bombing operations against
Singapore and Bangkok and so forth, I forecast for those. maIThen,
really, I gave these Air Force officers on-the-job training -aur
forecasting in there ab for a couple months)and then they'd go on
somewhere else and a fresh batch would come in. So, ah,...
R: So, you were the tropical expert in the Department.
D: So, by the time the war was over)I had more experience,really, than
any other meteorologist the Weather Bureau had in the tropics.and-so-
tha&=n&. Grady Norton's health was always rather poor and so that they
19
had me in reserve.and-ah, whenever Grady felt that because of health or
some other reason he would have to retire, it had long been planned to
send me down to take his place% well, of course, actually during
Hurricane Hazel in 1954, Grady Norton had this heart attack, you might
say he died with his boots on during the storm.nd-the-, but, it was
in October and at the end of the season so I didn't come until the
following Spring.
R: Ah-huh, and then since then the whole thing has, has bloomed,
A,koou A. so to speak, so that you are the first person who has in
the history of the Weather Bureau who's had the total responsibility
for the hurricane, for the hurricane C'., .
D: Yes that's right and ah, of course, its only during, oh, I guess it
must of been four years ago that they designated this the National
Hurricane Center and ah, made me Director of i5 and then they've
gradually been expanding its responsibilities.
R: Well, it certainly is an interesting...
D: Yeah.
R: Its an interesting thing and of course, it must of been fascinating
for you, building the whole thing up and starting it, and I can't think
of anything you could do more.
D: Then in addition to that, you've got such assignments as, I went over
to 'bck in East Pakistan for four months, this was back in 1961, to
.a. make...
R: You were just recently over there, too.
D: Yes, I was over there again,aky 1961, I made these recommendations
for the improvement of their cyclone warning service)and then S, this egq
ECFAE, this Economic Commission for Asia and ah, what is it, something
else, Far East. They held this meeting in ik and ah, so I was over
20
there in December for that -^hen.ae, going over to Philipines
M*
probably around the 20th of March y President Johnson's request, that
is7he made Atis promise to President Marcus when he visited over here
a few months ago ah, to make similar recommendations for the Philipines,
aaJdsa, I believe that its the intention of the President that
through A.I.D. to assist the Philipines in doing what's necessary there.
R: You mean for a hurricane, well, of course, there they're called
typhoons- I believe.
D: Yes, that's right.
R: Sort of a typhoon weather center similar to what they have here.
D: Yes, that's right, yeah.
R: Well, they certainly need it because they have tremendous loss of
life there, it seems.
D: Yes, and they have more than three times as many typhoons as
we have hurricanes.
R: .Ser So they really need it. Well, so it sounds to me that
your retirement 6- announced in the papers is just going to be like/
you're going twice as hard with all.
D: Well, I don't think so, ah, ah, I'm going to do pretty much what
my wife wants me to do. and--, I would like to
6 //
these lines in foreign countries but she say, well, if you have
a nice home in Coral Gables, ab why run off to the Philipines for ...
actually, I've been approached- a job over thereafter my retirement,
but T don't think I will take it becuase/she doesn't like Manila
too well and ah, and ah...
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