The 557th Weather Wing is a United States Air Force formation and its lead military meteorology center. It reports environmental situational awareness worldwide to the Air Force, the United States Army, joint warfighters, Unified Combatant Commands, the national intelligence community, and the Secretary of Defense. It is headquartered at Offutt Air Force Base, in Bellevue, Nebraska. The wing and subordinate weather squadrons collect, analyse, and generate a comprehensive weather database of forecast, climatological, and space weather products. Tasks The wing's task is to provide weather information to American military forces anytime. It is has over 1,800 active-duty, reserve, civilian and contract personnel and is headquartered on Offutt Air Force Base, Nebraska, with a $175 million annual budget. Weather forecasts are produced using numerical weather prediction software, such as the Weather Research and Forecasting model and the Unified Model. Organization The 557th Weather Wing is organized into a headquarters element consisting of staff agencies, two groups, three directorates, and five solar observatories. The 1st Weather Group, with headquarters at Offutt Air Force Base, aligns stateside weather operations with the Air Force war-fighting initiative overseeing Operational Weather Squadrons. Each of the squadrons produces forecasts for a specified area of the United States. The 15th Operational Weather Squadron, at Scott Air Force Base, Illinois, handles the Northern and Northeast United States; 25th Operational Weather Squadron, at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, Arizona, handles the Western United States; and 26th Operational Weather Squadron, at Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana, handles the Southern United States. The squadrons also train enlisted and officers. The 2nd Weather Group, with headquarters at Offutt Air Force Base, delivers terrestrial, space and climatological global weather information to Joint combatants, Department of Defence decision-makers, national agencies, and allied nations for the planning and execution of missions across the complete spectrum of military operations through the operation, sustainment and maintenance of Air Force Weather's US$277 million strategic center computer complex, production network, and applications. The group is composed of the 2nd Weather Squadron, 2nd Systems Operations Squadron, the 2nd Combat Weather Systems Squadron at Hurlburt Field, Florida, and the 14th Weather Squadron in Asheville, North Carolina. It also includes four solar observatories manned by detachments of the 2nd Weather Squadron: Det. 1, Learmonth, Australia; Det. 2, Sagamore Hill, Massachusetts; Det. 4, Holloman AFB, New Mexico; and Det. 5, Palehua, Hawaii. The Operations, Training and Evaluation Directorate (A3) delivers technical training for the career