| 1715 | Heavy rain, strong rain static. |
| 1716 | Rain continues but static only moderate. Some crash static intermittently. |
| 1720 | Getting darker, cloud more dense, rain very heavy, turbulence light. Rain static building up, blocking out Galveston radio range intermittently. |
| 1725 | Turbulence light to moderate, rain very heavy. |
| 1728 | Altitude 7300′. Free air temperature 46°, cloud getting somewhat lighter. |
| 1730 | Rain less heavy, cloud much lighter, ground visible through breaks. Surface wind apparently South Southeast. |
| 1735 | Crossed east leg of Galveston range and changed course to 330°. |
| 1740 | Now flying in thick cloud. Turbulence smooth to light. |
| 1743 | Turbulence moderate. |
| 1744 | Turbulence moderate to severe. |
| 1745 | Sighted clear space ahead and to the left. |
| 1746 | Now flying in “eye” of storm. Ground clearly visible, sun shining through upper clouds to the west. Circling to establish position. Surface wind South. |
| 1753 | Still circling. Altitude 5000′, temperature 73°. |
| 1800 | Headed west for Houston. Cloud very dense, rain light, turbulence moderate, intermittent precipitation static. |
| 1805 | Apparently in a thunderstorm. Altitude 5500′. Heavy rain, turbulence moderate to severe. Free air temperature now 46°. |
| 1815 | Changed heading to 10°. Rain light to moderate. Turbulence light. |
| 1825 | Headed 330°. Rain very light, turbulence almost smooth. Apparently flying between thick cloud layers. |
| 1835 | Altitude 5500′. Broken stratocumulus clouds below, high overcast of altostratus above. |
| 1836 | Breaking out into the open with high altostratus deck above. |
| 1900 | Landed at Bryan. Sky clear to the northwest. |
One sequel to this story was Duckworth’s discovery, a year later, that after these flights into the center, some of his instructors and supervisors who were checked out in B-25’s had sneaked out and flown the same hurricane! They were afraid to tell him about it at the time, for they did not have permission to do it, but he accidentally learned about it the next year, when he overheard some of them talking about their trips into the storm.
Altogether, Joe did not consider his flights into the hurricane to be as dangerous as some of his other weather flights. Only two things worried him at the time, the heavy precipitation static and the possibility that heavy rain might cause the engine to quit. Afterward, when pilots began to fly hurricanes as regular missions, the effect of torrential rain in lowering engine temperatures proved to be a real hazard and they had to take special precautions on this account.
Considering his hurricane penetration a routine weather flight at the time, Joe thought nothing more about it until he read a story in a Sunday paper, several weeks later. Then he had a telephone call from Brigadier General Luke Smith, at Randolph Field, who asked him to come down, and surprised him by saying that he knew of the incident. At Randolph, the General said that Joe was being recommended for the Distinguished Flying Cross. This never went through but later Joe did receive the Air Medal.
There were several amazing features about these flights into the vortex. First, they justified Duckworth’s unswerving confidence in his ability to fly safely through a hurricane; second, at the level of high flights there was a remarkable absence of violent up drafts or turbulence; third, they showed that quiet air in the center extended at least to heights of a mile to a mile and a half, and that at those levels the air in the center was much warmer than the air in the surrounding region of cloud, rain, and high winds. Joe is sorry now he did not organize his flight to get better scientific data. He believes his air temperature gauge probably was inaccurate. But, as he says, “It was just a lark—I didn’t think anybody would ever care or know about it!”
This demonstration was followed by an increasing number of penetrations by aircraft into the eyes of tropical storms, not all of which, by any means, were as uneventful as the flights by Duckworth and his fellow officers. After years of experience, the military services involved in flying hurricanes developed a technique which was essentially the same as that used by Duckworth in this first flight; that is, penetrate into the western semicircle and then into the center or eye from the southwest quadrant.
8. THE HAMMER AND THE HIGHWAY
Bellowing, there groan’d a noise
As of a sea in tempest torn
By warring winds. The stormy blast of Hades