Manual Inputs

The Manual Inputs room was one of the places we played pinochle after flying was over on the swing shift (usually 4:00PM till 12:00 AM) and on mids (usually Midnight till 7:00 AM). We also played on the Surveillance Dias and the Weapons Dias (with SD approval). This was because it was the only room with normal lighting.

Manual Inputs had one scope used by the Manual Data Supervisor (MDS). It had a curtain surrounding it to keep the light out.

Manual inputs had the responsibility of inputting all non-radar information. This data included the weather data, weapons and scramble status, air movement data (AMDs) and manual input tracks and special interest items.

Weather data included:

• Winds aloft were received every six hours but were considered current for eight hours in the event they were late. The wind speed, direction and temperature at 5,000 foot intervals from 5,000 feet to 80,000 feet were input into the Q-7 which used this information to compute intercept geometry.
• Base Met Watch is the current weather at each fighter base in the area (some recovery bases were in adjacent sectors). It was issued hourly but was updated as needed with Special MET Watches.
• Forecast weather is the weather forecast for each fighter base which a Met watch was received. The forecast weather was updated every three hours.

Base Weapons and Scramble Status provided the Battle Staff , Weapons Section and NORAD COC with the current status of all fighter  squadrons and bomarc and ADA (Nike Herc and Hawk) Batteries in the Sector/Region. Mandatory Scramble Status was declared by the Fighter Squadron Commander as a result of weather or other flying safety concerns. This meant that all scrambles from that base required approval from the Battle commander.

Air Movement Data (AMD) was the flight plans received from AMIS. This information provided the Identification Section with their primary tool to accomplish its mission.

Manual input tracks were tracks told to the region from adjacent regions in the event of overlap tell failure or from radar units in a manual environment. These tracks moved in a dead reckon status (DR) until associated with radar data.

Special Interest Items were:

• Zero Velocity tracks marked downed aircraft, the location of NUDETS, etc. They were also used to depict radar/radio quality control flight routes.
• ITAs were Intercept Training Areas. These depicted the boundaries of areas nor on the Master Operations Tape and temporary ITA assigned by FAA/MOT.
• The Manual Inputs Section also loaded major portions of the main operating program when the Q-7 came up in the Initiate Mode of recovery.

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