The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is working to enhance the Global Forecast System weather model in an effort to improve U.S. weather forecasting, including hurricane origins, snowfall location and heavy rainfall.

NOAA's current weather forecast model will combine with the WaveWatchIII, a global wave model used for ocean wave prediction, NOAA said Monday.

NOAA expects the combination to consolidate weather and wave forecasts, streamlining operations at the National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP). The update will also include atmospheric physics enhancements to support rain and snow forecasts.

“These upgrades are part of the Next Generation Global Prediction System (NGGPS) within the Unified Forecast System offsite link framework, which is an ongoing effort to leverage the expertise of the broader weather community and expedite the research to operations pathway,” said Vijay Tallapragada, chief of the modeling and data assimilation branch within NOAA’s Environmental Modeling Center.

“By coupling the WaveWatchIII and GFS models, we will extend current wave forecasts and integrate wave forecasting into the global model to streamline model products," he added.

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) has recommended that the Department of Defense (DOD) define the roles, authorities and responsibilities of DOD organizations and leadership positions responsible for hypersonic weapons development and acquisition efforts to ensure coordination.

GAO made the recommendation after it found that DOD has not documented the authorities, roles and responsibilities of its organizations overseeing development work on hypersonic weapons, according to a report published Monday.

“Such governing documentation would provide for a level of continuity when leadership and organizational priorities inevitably change, especially as hypersonic weapon development efforts are expected to continue over at least the next decade,” the report reads.

“Without clear leadership roles, responsibilities, and authorities, DOD is at risk of impeding its progress toward delivering hypersonic weapon capabilities and opening up the potential for conflict and wasted resources as decisions over larger investments are made in the future,” GAO noted.

The congressional watchdog identified 70 hypersonic weapons development projects spread across the Pentagon as well as the Department of Energy (DOE) and NASA in support of DOD. These initiatives have total reported funding of approximately $15 billion from fiscal year 2015 through FY 2024.

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is halfway through the first phase of a program that conducts human-machine collaborative dogfighting to advance the development of a scalable, trusted artificial intelligence-driven autonomy for air combat.

DARPA said Thursday that the Air Combat Evolution program has made several achievements including live flights of an L-29 jet trainer to measure a pilot’s trust in AI and virtual AI dogfights within and beyond visual range multi-aircraft scenarios.

“Our biggest focus at the end of Phase 1 is on the simulation-to-real transition of the AI algorithms as we prepare for live-fly sub-scale aircraft scenarios in late 2021,” said Col. Dan “Animal” Javorsek, program manager at DARPA’s Strategic Technology Office. “Managing this transition to the real world is a critical test for most AI algorithms.”

In Feb. 2020, the program’s algorithm development teams introduced a missile and a gun for longer- and shorter-range targets into the first AI scrimmage to demonstrate simulated 2-v-1 aerial dogfights at Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory. 

In August 2020, APL conducted the AlphaDogfight Trials in which an AI ‘pilot’ on an F-16 Viper jet came out undefeated against a human Air Force fighter pilot in five rounds of simulated air combat.

“Adding more weapon options and multiple aircraft introduces a lot of the dynamics that we were unable to push and explore in the AlphaDogfight Trials,” Javorsek said. “These new engagements represent an important step in building trust in the algorithms since they allow us to assess how the AI agents handle clear avenue of fire restrictions set up to prevent fratricide.”

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A panel of experts stated at a hearing before the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Cyber, Innovative Technologies and Information Systems that the U.S. military must better integrate electromagnetic spectrum operations throughout its ranks to succeed against U.S. adversaries. C4ISRNET reported the panel’s statements on Monday. 

“While the United States focused on counterterrorism operations over the last 20-plus years, China and Russia were working to advance their peer-to-peer military capabilities. That includes the [electromagnetic] spectrum operations,” commented Joseph Kirschbaum, director of defense capabilities and management at the Government Accountability Office (GAO). 

Kirschbaum and other panelists told Congress that in the past 30 years, American adversaries have significantly invested in technology that disrupts communication channels between units of every size and purpose. 

As a result, the U.S. is on the worse end of an electromagnetic spectrum capability gap. The panelist made clear the DOD has failed to achieve electromagnetic spectrum superiority because of a lack of organization and bureaucratic weaknesses. 

The electromagnetic spectrum is a strategic asset that is critical at all levels of conflict. The U.S. has historically used the electromagnetic spectrum only to achieve short-term tactical outcomes for warfighters. 

Bill Conley, a former Department of Defense (DOD) electronic warfare specialist, said that what the Chinese have achieved operationally is really pretty darn impressive.” Conley also noted that one of the best strategic offensives the U.S. could invest in is the electromagnetic spectrum, increasing commanders’ ability to maneuver their forces. 

“This is a dramatic departure from our platform and program-centric legacy investment strategy that we have pursued. Electromagnetic battle management, the dynamic reconfiguration of our sensors, of our networks, as well as our electromagnetic attacks in real-time, may become the preferred way to achieve power projection when compared to the defensive utilization of the electromagnetic spectrum … instead of viewing capability gaps and shortfalls, (electromagnetic spectrum operations) can actually create opportunities for us,” Conley concluded. 

Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) broke ground at Kirtland Air Force Base to mark the construction of a new 3,500-square-foot facility for space environment research. The $3.5 million Skywave Technology Laboratory will allow researchers to test large antennas and sensor systems outdoors before deployment, Kirtland AFB said Thursday.

“The Skywave Lab will provide the work space our team needs for space environment research, which involves developing and testing new instrumentation, preparing for field experiments around the globe, as well as collecting and processing data to support ionospheric and radio frequency research,” said Todd Parris, leader of AFRL's geospace environment impacts and applications branch at Kirtland AFB.

AFRL's team of field testers deploy technologies designed to forecast the ionosphere and how changes in space weather can affect space systems. These tests involve the use of optical and radio diagnostics to generate more data on the ionosphere.

The Department of Energy (DOE) intends to award a total of $34.5 million in funds to support research efforts on data science and computation-based approaches that could forecast harsh weather patterns, address scientific gaps and accelerate clean energy technology development. 

DOE said Friday it will provide up to $21 million across a three-year period to research projects that will explore the use of data science methods for chemical and material science matters such as chemical processes for energy storage.

The department also plans to award $13.5 million to projects that will focus on helping research facilities speed up scientific discovery through networking infrastructure and computer-based models.

DOE will obligate a cumulative sum of $11.5 million for the two funding opportunities within the current fiscal year.