364 The National Geographic Magazine 



gained their future course and intensity 

 is quite successfully forecast. Kver}^ 

 twelve hours the kaleidoscope changes, 

 and a new graphic picture of weather 

 conditions is shown. Nowhere else in 

 the world can meteorologists find such 

 an opportunity to study storms and at- 

 mospheric changes. 



TANGIBLE RESULTS OF WEATHER 

 BUREAU WORK 



Has the Weather Bureau won its way 

 into the hearts and confidence of the 

 American people, and do we feel that 

 the expenditures made for its support 

 are wisely made ? I^et us answer this 

 question by giving some facts relative 

 to the number of people and industries 

 that are daily in communication with 

 the Bureau. In our Atlantic and Gulf 

 ports, alone, there are floating over 

 ^30,000,000 worth of craft on any day 

 of the year ; and at every port, whether 

 on the Atlantic, on the Pacific, or on the 

 Ivakes, there is either a full meteorolog- 

 ical observatory or else a storm-warning 

 displayman who attends to the lighting 

 of the danger lights on the storm-warn- 

 ing towers at night, to the display of 

 danger flags by day, and to the distribu- 

 tion of storm-warning messages among 

 vessel masters. This system is so per- 

 fect that the Chief of the Weather Bu- 

 reau, or the forecaster on duty at the 

 Central office, can dictate a storm warn- 

 ing and feel certain that inside of one 

 hour a copy of the warning will be in 

 the hands of ever}^ vessel master in every 

 port of material size in the United States, 

 provided that it is his desire that a com- 

 plete distribution of the warning be 

 made. As a matter of fact, the storm 

 warnings usually go only to a limited 

 portion of the coast at one time. While 

 the daily predictions of rain or snow, by 

 which, as previousl}^ stated, the public 

 measures the value of the weather serv- 

 ice, are subject to a considerable element 

 of error, namely about one failure in five 



predictions, the marine warnings of the 

 service have been so well made that in 

 over six years no protracted storm has 

 reached any point of the United States 

 without the danger warnings being dis- 

 played well in advance. As a result of 

 these warnings the loss of life and prop- 

 erty has been reduced to a minimum, 

 being doubtless not more than 25 per 

 cent of what it would have been with- 

 out this extensive system, which comes 

 daily, and almost hourly, into commu- 

 nication with mariners. The public does 

 not appreciate this part of the service 

 that, as a rule, these warnings do not 

 appear in the newspapers because it is 

 not desirable to publish them so far in 

 advance as to unnecessarily hold ship- 

 ping in port. We only aim to place 

 warnings twelve to sixteen hours in ad- 

 vance of the coming of the storm, and 

 then we communicate by telegraph, by 

 messenger, and by warning lights and 

 flags directly with the masters of vessels. 

 It is a notable example of the utility of 

 the new West Indian weather service, 

 and of the wisdom of Congress in con- 

 tinuing as a perpetual instrument of 

 peace the service organized to meet an 

 emergency of war, that the Galveston 

 hurricane was detected on September i , 

 at the time of its inception, in the ocean 

 south of Porto Rico, and that the new 

 system of West Indian reports gave us 

 such complete simultaneous data that at 

 no time did we lose track of the storm, 

 and everywhere, as it progressed north- 

 ward, such full information was given 

 that, notwithstanding the extensive com- 

 merce of the Gulf of Mexico, little or no 

 loss of life or property occurred upon the 

 open waters of the Gulf, and the destruc- 

 tion at Galveston was many times less 

 than it would have been without the 

 premonition that was given and the 

 activity of the Bureau's officers in urg- 

 ing the people to move from the low 

 ground of the city to its more secure 

 portions. Again, as this storm recurved 

 and passed over the Ivake region, the 



