A new micro weather sensor could help prevent helicopter disasters in inclement weather downrange.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The solar powered Micro Weather Sensor, produced by Physical Optics Corporation, weighs less than a pound and can be left unattended to perform all weather observations troops may need.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The device is already being used by select units in the U.S. Africa Command area of operations and could soon be purchased by the wider Defense Department.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIn AFRICOM, what we\u2019re having now is specific Special Forces teams go out and put these in place,\u201d said Ben Self, director of business development at POC. \u201cIt can do temperature, rainfall, determine ceilings of up to 5,000 feet, but the ones in Africa are actually kicking back readings of up to 9,000 feet.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Those cloud ceilings make the sensor especially useful for low flying fixed-wing aircraft, like those performing parachute operations, and rotary-wing aircraft that face problematic weather in a variety of operations, Self said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Crashes involving inclement weather, like the May 2017 helicopter crash in Nepal that killed six Marines, are driving the Pentagon to find sensors like the MWS that can push the necessary weather data to crews as early as possible, Self said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe Marines, especially, after that incident, bought 25 units out of the gate,\u201d Self said. \u201cWe\u2018re trying to get into a program of record with the DoD, though, so that everyone can purchase through a program … instead of individual purchase orders. That\u2019s the idea as far as getting them into the hands of operators.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The device is already being used by select units in the U.S. Africa Command area of operations and could soon be purchased by the wider Defense Department.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":34544,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":75,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[75,29,162,36],"tags":[],"coauthors":[3374],"class_list":["post-16905","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-air-force-association","category-digital-show-dailies","category-digital-show-daily","category-newsletters"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"TIBUDH4KNREPDNWANZUIDKCQ64","arc_canonical_url":"\/news\/your-air-force\/2017\/09\/19\/new-weather-sensors-could-save-lives-downrange\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n