Crews from the Air Force Reserve’s 53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron recently flew several missions into Tropical Storm Bertha from an airport in St. Croix in the US Virgin Islands. The “Hurricane Hunters” flew their first low-level flight into the storm last week to gather data on which way the storm’s winds were rotating, they then flew another six-hour sortie in the unit’s WC-130J to determine the center of the low-pressure storm. The 53rd WRS provided near real-time data for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Hurricane Center, to help determine the storm’s trajectory, Lt. Col. Jon Talbot, 53rd WRS chief meteorologist said. As of early Tuesday, according to NHC projections, the storm had veered north, headed into the Atlantic, and was downgraded to a Tropical Storm.
The rate of building B-21 bombers would speed up if the fiscal 2026 defense budget passes. But it remains unclear how much capacity would be added, and whether the Air Force would simply build the bombers faster, or buy more.
