Ky. native part of hurricane hunter team that flew into Ian
LEXINGTON, Ky. (WKYT) - “Hurricane hunters” fly into the hurricanes to get crucial and important readings to let people know how strong the storms are.
One of those hurricane hunters, Lt. Col Steven Burton, is from Lincoln County, Kentucky.
He and his wife now both fly hurricane hunter missions from their home in Mississippi.
Burton has been with the Air Force since college and has been to Iraq and Afghanistan. He joined the reserves and said his work in flying into hurricanes was part of a plan to try something different.
Burton is a navigator and was on one of the missions that flew into Hurricane Ian. He says it was a category two storm when they flew into it near Cuba. He says these missions are tools that are able to get data they wouldn’t be able to get any other way.
Burton says he’s flown numerous hurricane missions, about a hundred or so over the past eight years. He lives in Biloxi and says one of the missions he was on was actually a storm that would later hit his house. He says it’s hard sometimes to prepare for a storm when it’s your job to fly into them.
Burton tells us he loves Lincoln County so much that he and his wife plan to move back when they retire from service.
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