Page 232 - James Rodger Fleming - Fixing the sky

and playing a more central role than has hitherto been acknowledged. In 1954
he helped institutionalize the U.S. Joint Numerical Weather Prediction Unit, a
partnership of the weather bureau with the air force and navy “to produce prog-
nostic weather charts on an operational basis using numerical techniques.” A
year later, after a successful numerical experiment by Norman Phillips, in which
he was able to simulate realistic features of the general circulation of the atmo-
sphere, von Neumann and Wexler argued for the creation of a General Circula-
tion Research Section (later Laboratory) in the weather bureau. The Geophysi-
cal Fluid Dynamics Lab in Princeton, New Jersey, and the National Centers for
Environmental Prediction in Camp Springs, Maryland, trace their origins to
these roots. 64
Taking up Rossby’s call for more information about geophysical interac-
tions between the Northern Hemisphere and the Southern Hemisphere, Wex-
ler accepted the added challenge involved in serving as chief scientist for the
U.S. expedition to the Antarctic for the International Geophysical Year (IGY;
1957–1958). By doing so, he could integrate critical new information about both
the South Pole and the Southern Hemisphere into a global picture of circulation
and dynamics of the entire atmosphere. Wexler also incorporated the results of
theoretical work on the influence of rising carbon dioxide levels into the weather
bureau’s climate-modeling efforts and instituted radiation, ozone, and, notably,
carbon dioxide measurements at the Mauna Loa observatory, which were estab-
lished under his guidance just prior to the IGY. 65
Atmospheric observation by rockets and satellites also came under Wexler’s
purview. He served as chairman of several influential committees on this sub-
ject, including the Upper-Atmosphere Committee of the American Geophysi-
cal Union, the National Advisory Committee on Aviation’s Special Committee
for the Upper Atmosphere, and the National Research Council’s Space Science
Board. Wexler was in charge of the meteorology of the TIRoS (Television Infra-
red observation Satellite) meteorological satellite program and helped support
the first Earth heat budget experiment flown on Explorer 7. In 1961 the Kennedy
administration appointed Wexler as the lead negotiator for the United States
in talks with the Soviet Union concerning the joint use of meteorological satel-
lites. The negotiations expanded into a multinational effort to institute a World
Weather Watch (WWW), with Wexler and Soviet academician Victor A. Bugaev
as the architects for a new program to be administered by the World Meteorolog-
ical organization in Geneva. Formally established in 1963 and still in existence,
the World Weather Watch coordinates the efforts of member nations by com-
bining observing systems, telecommunication facilities, and data-processing and
forecasting centers to make available meteorological and related environmental

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