Assessing and Communicating Climate Variability and Its Impacts on DoD Operations

The 14th Weather Squadron (14 WS) is the U.S. military organization charged with delivering climate information and services to entities of the Department of Defense (DoD). Increasingly, climate services provided by the Squadron include active climate monitoring, analysis, and subseasonal-to-seasonal prediction. As a result, the 14 WS has developed a range of tools to deliver these climate services to external users and has expanded its internal training program to support this growth. Given the diversity of supported users—in terms of experience, education, and/or application—the 14 WS provides a variety of decision-grade climate services, ranging from static graphics to text-based, analysts-in-the-loop “climate watch” discussions. The latter requires that analysts identify climate patterns and understand the leading modes of climate variability and their possible impacts on DoD operations. The unit continues to refine its internal training program—to include an introductory climate course and recurring training on related topics—to provide newly assigned climate analysts with the requisite knowledgebase to assess and communicate the impacts of climate variability on military operations. Here, we showcase examples of climate services and associated training used by the 14 WS to assess and communicate climate impacts to diverse users.