Admiral Sir George Somers' flagship Sea Venture near Fort St. Catherine in what was most likely a hurricane.

But it wasn't until the 19th and early 20th centuries that detailed weather observations and accounts were documented by elements of the Royal Engineers, the British Army Medical Office and the Canadian Weather Bureau.

In August 1932, an important decision was made to establish a Bermuda Government Meteorological Station at Fort George, St. George's. In October 1939, Dr. W.A. Macky took over as the first Director of the Bermuda Meteorological Office and remained its head until December 1968.

In 1941, while Fort Bell US Army base was under construction, the US Army Signal Corps established a small weather office at the Castle Harbour Hotel.

In December of that year, a detachment of the 8th Weather Squadron moved on to Fort Bell to set up their office at Kindley Airfield.

US Army Air Force weather forecasters provided meteorological services for the air field until 1947, when they were relieved by the newly formed US Air Force. It was at this time that Fort Bell was renamed Kindley Air Force Base.

In 1952, the U.S. Navy initiated its own weather service in Bermuda with the establishment of a Naval Weather Service Environmental Detachment at the Naval Air Station, Annex to support seaplanes and ships.

Seven years later, in 1959, in an agreement between the governments of the United States and the United Kingdom, Kindley Air Force Base assumed all meteorological forecasting responsibilities for Bermuda.

This responsibility shifted to the US Navy in 1970, when jurisdiction for the air base shifted to the US Navy and Kindley Field was renamed the US Naval Air Station, Bermuda.

And this year another shift in power -- this time the American withdrawal from the Base -- has given control of these responsibilities to a Bermudian staff, trained by Serco Aviation Services while the transfer takes place. The US Naval Weather Service Environmental Detachment (later renamed the Naval Oceanography Command Detachment) served as the sole forecasting activity for both the Naval Air Station and the Bermuda Government through 1981.

It was in October of that year that the Chief of Naval Operations, in recognition of the unique responsibilities of the Naval Oceanography Command Detachment to Bermuda, upgraded the Detachment and renamed it the Naval Oceanography Command Facility, Bermuda.

With the transfer of the US Naval Annex to Bermudian hands last year, forecasting and hurricane-watching is becoming the province of the island's own, locally-run Bermuda Weather Service.

It's wiser to secure boats before storms hit Nothing is safe from a hurricane as shown with this fallen antenna on Smith's Island HURRICANES SUPPLEMENT HUR