amateur weather prophet are losing out in the demand for accurate information. Modern economics can’t depend on them. Long flights and important business ventures which need fair weather must have better foundation than:
Mackerel in the sky,
Three days dry.
“How many ships report ocean weather information?” I asked.
“Not nearly so many as we need,” Dr. Kimball sighed. “We haven’t adequate appropriation yet for all the service we’d like, but it’s much better than it used to be. The storms over the North Atlantic are larger than any known on land, extending sometimes in one vast disturbance from Newfoundland to the British Isles. That is the extent—how high they are, we do not know.
“During the hurricane season a hundred or more ships in West Indian waters report. If vessels in the North sent regular data, our over-ocean weather maps should be pretty efficient. That’s important for maritime commerce, and of course essential in the development of transatlantic flying. Also such information would help us tremendously in forecasting weather conditions on shore, both for our own continent and for Europe.”
Dr. Kimball, like so many others, believes that regular transatlantic air service, whether by dirigibles or airplanes, is inevitable—and near. As a matter of fact, one of the barriers to it today is lack
