MIL-STD-210A, 'Climatic Extremes for Military Equipment', is being revised. The revision will include two sets of windspeed design goals for military equipment being developed for worldwide usage over land: (1) the speed up to which 'operations' are expected to proceed, (2) the speed that equipment should 'withstand' without irreversible damage. A study of gustiness and variations of wind with height during strong wind regimes is presented. Nomograms of gust factor versus gust duration and steady windspeed are used to assign the most dynamically effective gust according to equipment dimensions. Based on a power-law relationship, factors for adjusting windspeed to a common height to describe windspeed and gusts over the vertical extent of military equipment usage are presented. Also included is a tabulation of wind statistics for selected stations considered in the search for worldwide wind extremes.

The Design Climatology Branch of the Air Force Cambridge Research Laboratories had the scientific responsibility for leading a DoD Task Group effort to revise MIL-STD-210A 'Climatic Extremes for Military Equipment'. This document represents the fruition of the goals of the task group. It relates the background studies supporting the values in MIL-STD-210B, so that MIL-STD-210B users need to consult only this single document for an elaboration on the MIL- STD-210B extremes. In addition, the report contains information on the origin, necessity for and the events leading to a revision of MIL-STD-210A. Discussions of the major changes in the Standard's philosophy and its contents are also provided.