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| Bad consequences are starting to emerge from the Trump administration's firing of hundreds of NOAA employees. |
Obviously, we'll focus on NOAA and other weather and climate entities here, since that's the subject of this here blog thingy, so we'll give whatever updates we can.
I'm saying "whatever updates we can," because everything the Trump administration is doing is chaotic, on again, off again, just going along with the whims of the moment.
Kind of like a regular weather forecast, what will happen next with Trump and Elon Musk and NOAA and NWS is subject to change. But of course more unpredictable than the weather.
Speaking of which, I have more evidence that the weather itself will get more unpredictable, thanks to some emerging practical effects of the government slashing.
The National Weather Service offices in Albany, New York and Gray, Maine this past week announced they are suspending some weather balloon launches due to lack of staff.
Usually, the National Weather Service launches weather balloons twice a day from 100 sites. These balloon launches take detailed weather measurements through multiple layers of the atmosphere. This data is fed into the computer models that guide weather forecasts.
The fewer balloon launches, the less data goes in, so the accuracy of the computer forecasts goes downhill.
Meteorologist Mallory Brooke, writing on Facebook, explained it this way.
"Weather balloon launches are critical in understanding what's happening in the atmosphere. Weather isn't created on the ground, it's above our heads! These cuts will have huge implications on forecasting, data accuracy, reliability, and ultimately knowledge of what's coming our way. AI *cannot* replace this --- this is the core of how our computer models are initialized and run.
It's like trying to bake a cake but you're going to guess what temperatures to set the oven at. Doesn't usually work out well. These are sad days for the science community as a whole."
Balloon launches were previously canceled up in Alaska, which is bad because there's already a dearth of data from the far north, which is often a weakness in computer models, This will just make it worse.
MORE FIRINGS CONFUSION/FEARS
There's been conflicting reports of whether some NOAA employees that were fired under Elon Musk's DOGE hatchet firings were reinstated or not.
An unknown number of some probationary employees - individuals who have worked for their federal agency for less than year - have been reinstated. For instance, three meteorologists let go from the Boise, Idaho National Weather Service office reportedly have their jobs back.
Also, the building housing the National Weather Center in Norman, Oklahoma appears to be off the closing list, at least for now. The center is a hub for weather research, forecasting and supercomputers that house crucial computer model data.
Meanwhile, there are reports that more NOAA firings are in the offing.
Details are emerging about the kind of forecasting and disaster services and activities going away because of the cutbacks
Hurricane Hunters
Included in the chaotic firings appears to be a group of hurricane researchers, two hurricane hunter flight directors and an engineer.
The hurricane hunter cutbacks are concerning to say the least. These are the seemingly crazy people who fly planes into hurricanes. Their work is invaluable. The dense data the collect from flying into these storms are critical in helping forecast where the storm is going and how strong it will get.
As we learned from Hurricane Helene and Milton last year, and from countless other hurricanes, knowing as precisely as possible where they will hit and at what intensity is essential for getting people out of harm's way, stacking resources in advance where you will need them, and accurately warning the public about what's to come.
The cutbacks in hurricane experts threatens to diminish the accuracy of the hurricane forecasts. Even if you don't care about human life, and just care about financial responsibility. these firings do not make sense.
Inaccurate forecasts mean that coming up, people who should have been warned to get out of the way weren't, and people who were warned of an impending hurricane and fled would do so unnecessarily, as the storm went off in a different direction, due to bad forecasting.
Fired federal hurricane researchers had also been working on improving forecasting models. So better forecast accuracy is once again out the window.
I guess Elon Musk is rich enough to avoid danger from hurricanes. The little people who would bear the brunt of these storms don't really matter, do they?
FEMA AND WILDFIRES
It's already been a busy year for wildfires, with that mega firestorm in Los Angeles in January. Plus other wildfires in Texas, South Carolina, North Carolina, South Dakota, North Dakota, New York and other states already.
You'd want well-trained crews to fight these fires. But that's not on the Trump agenda either, apparently.
The National Fire Academy, the nations pre-eminent federal fire training center, has canceled its wildfire training courses as amid what it announced was the "process of evaluating agency programs and spending alignment with Administration priorities," the Associated Press reported.
In other words, battling wildfires and saving lives and property is not a Trump administration priority. Good to know.
Wildfire training was set to begin next week. People already had their plane tickets ready to go to this thing. Maybe we can get Donald Trump and Elon Musk to rake the forests so that we won't have any wildfires?
I dunno.
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