Latest news with #RichardSpinrad
Black America Web
09-07-2025
- Climate
- Black America Web
Are NOAA Weather Cuts Leaving Black Communities Vulnerable This Storm Season?
Source: Anadolu / Getty Texans are still reeling from the devastating July 4th flash flood that swept through the Guadalupe River region, leaving at least 109 people dead, including 27 children, according to USA TODAY . The disaster is now considered the deadliest flash flood in recent U.S. history, and experts are raising urgent concerns over whether federal staffing cuts played a role in the tragedy. The catastrophic flood has reignited scrutiny of sweeping layoffs at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), many of which were initiated earlier this year by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). With more than 880 NOAA and National Weather Service (NWS) employees laid off in two rounds of cuts, some meteorologists and climate researchers say the reductions may have compromised the agency's capacity to respond effectively to the extreme weather. As noted by Yale Climate Connections despite facing a 22% staff reduction due to the intense budget cuts, the New Braunfels National Weather Service (NWS) office still managed to issue flood watches over 12 hours in advance and multiple flash flood warnings to residents in the Texas Hill Country areas — including a 'Flash Flood Emergency' alert at 4:03 a.m. for Kerr County. The New Braunfels office also hired more staff in preparation for the storm, boosting its weather team from two to five members. However, Dr. Richard Spinrad, a former NOAA administrator, claimed that one critical role was vacant before the disaster hit: the Warning Coordination Meteorologist. Although staffing levels were deemed adequate and the White House acknowledged that forecasts, watches, and warnings were issued promptly, the critical issue lies in whether those messages were actually received and acted upon. That responsibility typically falls to the Warning Coordination Meteorologist — a key liaison between forecasters and local emergency managers — but that position was vacant at the time of the disaster. 'I am convinced that the staff cuts that we saw were a contributing factor to the inability of the emergency managers to respond,' Spinrad told CNN's Kate Bolduan on July 8. Unfortunately, additional roles are expected to be eliminated in the coming year, as the proposed budget released in June would reduce NOAA's workforce from over 12,000 to around 10,000 employees, according to the Federal News Network. DOGE's staff cuts were not only detrimental to safety, but they could harm future research needed to prevent catastrophic storms from occurring in the future. NOAA's 2026 proposed budget includes sweeping cuts that would eliminate several research labs, including the National Severe Storms Lab (NSSL) in Norman, Oklahoma — the birthplace of the FLASH system, a tool that significantly improves the accuracy and timing of flash flood warnings. The department also developed the Multi-Radar/Multi-Sensor (MRMS) system, designed to enhance decision-making during severe weather events. This advanced technology supports more accurate forecasts and warnings by providing critical data for hazardous weather, hydrology, aviation, transportation, and numerical weather prediction. Alan Gerard, a former researcher and analyst with NOAA's NSSL, warned that eliminating the NSSL could lead the country down a dangerous path, severely limiting our ability to advance warning technologies that help people take life-saving action during extreme weather events. 'If we had advanced modeling and forecasting that would be able to tell you there's a pretty high chance that this area is going to get six to nine inches of rain in three hours tonight—that's a whole different situation,' the weather expert explained during an interview with MSNBC on July 7. 'We don't have that capability right now, but with research and developments that we're doing, like the National Severe Storms Lab, we could within the next several years.' Miami-based hurricane specialist Michael Lowry expressed a similar sentiment in a blog post shared Monday. 'The terrible events in Texas the past few days do serve as a salient reminder of why NOAA-developed tools and National Weather Service forecasts are so critical to this country,' he penned. 'One of the primary tools we use to predict flash floods like the ones in Central Texas come from the Multi-Radar/Multi-Sensor System, a project of the National Severe Storms Laboratory or NSSL in Norman, Oklahoma. I've zero doubt NWS forecasters were leveraging that tool that evening to issue flash flood warnings. The National Severe Storms Laboratory and associated projects like this one are slated for elimination in NOAA's proposed 2026 budget, which would be detrimental to our ability to forecast these types of deadly floods in the future.' Looking ahead, the tragedy in Texas foreshadows broader concerns about climate vulnerability and environmental justice. According to a 2023 Congressional Budget Office (CBO) study, lower-income and Black communities face a rapidly rising flood risk due to climate change and sea-level rise. In 2023, the CBO found that by 2050, Black communities — particularly along the Gulf and Atlantic coasts — will face at least a 20% increase in flood risk. Coastal states like Texas, Florida, and Virginia are home to many of these at-risk populations. Additionally, a 2020 study led by the University of Arizona found that Black and Hispanic communities, as well as individuals with low incomes, are more likely to live in areas at high risk of flooding from natural disasters compared to white and Asian populations, leaving them at a greater risk of danger. It's becoming abundantly clear that flood risk isn't just growing — it's growing unequally. Climate change is making these events more frequent and more deadly. Cutting our ability to predict and prepare for them is a risk we simply can't afford. SEE MORE: 10 Modern-Day Examples Of Environmental Racism Environmental Racism: How Racist Policies Around Climate Affect Black People SEE ALSO Are NOAA Weather Cuts Leaving Black Communities Vulnerable This Storm Season? was originally published on
CNBC
03-06-2025
- Business
- CNBC
Trump job cuts hobble NOAA team that reopens ports after hurricanes, sources say
A Florida-based federal emergency response team that reopens U.S. ports after storms and accidents is unstaffed this hurricane season largely due to widespread federal workforce reductions driven by the Trump administration, according to two sources familiar with the matter. The closure of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration's Navigation Response Team in Fernandina, Florida – one of the network's six national locations - could mean slower response times and longer port closures if hurricanes slam into the U.S. Southeast this summer, the sources said. The teams are charged with deploying survey vessels to ports to locate underwater hazards that must be cleared to reopen shipping, and have been crucial in the aftermath of major storms like those that struck the Gulf Coast in recent years, as well as disasters like the 2024 collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore. "I know that the Florida navigation response team is completely out of commission for this hurricane season, in large part due to staffing cuts," said former NOAA Administrator Richard Spinrad, who has been in contact with the agency. Retired rear admiral Tim Gaulladet, who served as deputy NOAA administrator during the first Trump presidency, also said he is aware that the Florida location is no longer staffed, and that other offices have less capacity. NOAA did not respond to a specific question about the status of the Florida NRT and reduced NRT staffing but said the agency would be prepared this hurricane season. "In the event that ports are impacted by a hurricane or maritime disaster, NOAA will mobilize one or more Navigation Response Teams to be on scene after receiving an official request from the U.S. Coast Guard or Army Corps of Engineers," NOAA spokesperson Jasmine Blackwell NRT locations include Connecticut, Maryland, Mississippi, Washington state, and Galveston, Texas - a major U.S. oil-industry port. The NRT's home website was changed in March to remove both the Florida and Galveston, Texas locations, according to archived images of the site. NOAA did not respond to queries about the status of other locations and employees. The American Pilots Association did not directly comment on the cuts but said they will ensure that their members, consisting of harbor pilots who guide commercial ships in and out of U.S. ports, will continue to carry out this function and that its members who are ship captains and harbor pilots have the resources they need to protect maritime commerce. NOAA's National Weather Service in May forecast an above-average June 1-Nov. 30 hurricane season with six to 10 hurricanes. Its director, Ken Graham, said at the time he did not expect job cuts at NOAA to affect hurricane response. But sources said staff cuts which have amounted to around 1,000 people or 10% of its workforce so far have stretched the agency thin. Around 600 of the cuts are within NOAA's National Weather Service, said Tom Fahy, legislative director for the National Weather Service Employees Organization. He said the cuts mean the loss for the first time of around-the-clock staffing at several U.S. weather offices, and staffing shortages of 40% in some key places like Miami-Dade and Key West in Florida. At least six NWS offices have also stopped the routine twice-a-day weather balloon launches that collect data for weather models, he said. "The employees' resilience has been stretched to the breaking point," he said. While NOAA attempts to reshuffle staff to keep services going, a period of overlapping weather events – like tornadoes, wildfires and hurricanes all at once - could push the already stretched staff to its limits and make things impossible, said Spinrad. "This is like playing Whac-a-Mole with forecasters," he said. "We're going to be hard pressed to provide the standard of service that the public is used to."
Reuters
03-06-2025
- Climate
- Reuters
Trump job cuts hobble NOAA team that reopens ports after hurricanes, sources say
WASHINGTON, June 3 (Reuters) - A Florida-based federal emergency response team that reopens U.S. ports after storms and accidents is unstaffed this hurricane season largely due to widespread federal workforce reductions driven by the Trump administration, according to two sources familiar with the matter. The closure of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration's Navigation Response Team in Fernandina, Florida – one of the network's six national locations - could mean slower response times and longer port closures if hurricanes slam into the U.S. Southeast this summer, the sources said. The teams are charged with deploying survey vessels to ports to locate underwater hazards that must be cleared to reopen shipping, and have been crucial in the aftermath of major storms like those that struck the Gulf Coast in recent years, as well as disasters like the 2024 collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore. "I know that the Florida navigation response team is completely out of commission for this hurricane season, in large part due to staffing cuts," said former NOAA Administrator Richard Spinrad, who has been in contact with the agency. Retired rear admiral Tim Gaulladet, who served as deputy NOAA administrator during the first Trump presidency, also said he is aware that the Florida location is no longer staffed, and that other offices have less capacity. NOAA did not respond to a specific question about the status of the Florida NRT and reduced NRT staffing but said the agency would be prepared this hurricane season. "In the event that ports are impacted by a hurricane or maritime disaster, NOAA will mobilize one or more Navigation Response Teams to be on scene after receiving an official request from the U.S. Coast Guard or Army Corps of Engineers," NOAA spokesperson Jasmine Blackwell said. Other NRT locations include Connecticut, Maryland, Mississippi, Washington state, and Galveston, Texas - a major U.S. oil-industry port. The NRT's home website was changed in March to remove both the Florida and Galveston, Texas locations, according to archived images of the site. NOAA did not respond to queries about the status of other locations and employees. The American Pilots Association did not directly comment on the cuts but said they will ensure that their members, consisting of harbor pilots who guide commercial ships in and out of U.S. ports, will continue to carry out this function and that its members who are ship captains and harbor pilots have the resources they need to protect maritime commerce. NOAA's National Weather Service in May forecast an above-average June 1-Nov. 30 hurricane season with six to 10 hurricanes. Its director, Ken Graham, said at the time he did not expect job cuts at NOAA to affect hurricane response. But sources said staff cuts which have amounted to around 1,000 people or 10% of its workforce so far have stretched the agency thin. Around 600 of the cuts are within NOAA's National Weather Service, said Tom Fahy, legislative director for the National Weather Service Employees Organization. He said the cuts mean the loss for the first time of around-the-clock staffing at several U.S. weather offices, and staffing shortages of 40% in some key places like Miami-Dade and Key West in Florida. At least six NWS offices have also stopped the routine twice-a-day weather balloon launches that collect data for weather models, he said. "The employees' resilience has been stretched to the breaking point," he said. While NOAA attempts to reshuffle staff to keep services going, a period of overlapping weather events – like tornadoes, wildfires and hurricanes all at once - could push the already stretched staff to its limits and make things impossible, said Spinrad. "This is like playing Whac-a-Mole with forecasters," he said. "We're going to be hard pressed to provide the standard of service that the public is used to."
CBS News
13-05-2025
- Climate
- CBS News
How National Weather Service staffing shortages are already making weather forecasts worse
There are 122 National Weather Service (NWS) offices nationwide, each of which performs critical lifesaving duties every day from issuing tornado warnings to keeping airplanes out of hazardous weather. But many NWS offices are now short-staffed, following recent Department of Government Efficiency-ordered staff cuts and voluntary early retirements. CBS News Chicago found that scaled-back services are already making weather forecasts from your phone to your television less accurate. "I do think public safety is going to be more in jeopardy," said Dr. Richard Spinrad, who served as the Administrator for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) under the administration of President Barack Obama. Dr. Richard Spinrad, former NOAA Administrator Dr. Richard Spinrad Dr. Spinrad expressed concern that the number of certain employees serving a vital role in local NWS offices, electronics technicians, is down by at least 16%. "That means the Weather Service's ability to operate, maintain, fix, repair the weather radars is going to be compromised," he said. Meteorologists at television stations use that radar data to help track and forecast dangerous storms during severe weather season. "There is a high likelihood that through the season, one or two or more radars will not be fully operable at a time that there's a major spate of tornadoes developing," Dr. Spinrad said. That is important as severe weather season ramps up in the Upper Midwest, and studies show that tornado alley is shifting eastward into Illinois as the climate changes. In 2024, the Chicago area experienced an all-time record 63 tornadoes. Most of those came in back-to-back outbreaks on July 14 and 15. The staffing shortage could also impact summer vacation travel plans, as the NWS also handles critical airline weather forecasts. "I expect we're going to see a lot more delays and cancellations due to weather, just because we cannot get the information into the hands of the FAA and the commercial airlines as well," said Dr. Spinrad. CBS News Chicago tried to determine the current extent of staff shortages at weather offices nationwide by calling many offices directly, checking online, and reaching out to the NWS and NOAA. Local offices referred us to NOAA. NOAA responded via email by writing, "Per long-standing practice, we don't discuss internal personnel and management matters." Online, however, we found that 43% of those 122 weather service offices actually post staffing information — including positions, names, and vacancies that anyone can see. Dr. Spinrad says the new round of job cuts only exacerbates an existing serious shortage. "The Weather Service really needed to hire a lot of people, even well before we saw all of these impacts of somewhere in the neighborhood of about 1,500 people now down," he said. Those 1,500 empty jobs are about one-third of the entire NWS workforce. Indicating there are empty seats in NWS offices, NOAA went on to write, "The National Weather Service is adjusting some services at our local forecast offices throughout the country in order to best meet the needs of the public…" One of those services being adjusted is the usual twice-a-day launch of weather balloons from dozens of offices across the country. A total of 67 NWS offices launch weather balloons, which serve a critical role in weather forecasting. As balloons ascend through the depths of the atmosphere, they feed data into computers that help meteorologists forecast the weather. These data serve to supplement and improve data from satellites and the ground network of weather observing stations. The weather balloons launched west of Chicago in the Great Plains provide especially valuable information to the CBS News Chicago First Alert Weather team, as most of our weather comes from that direction. The weather team uses that information, along with the most up-to-date weather technology in Chicago, to be able to accurately inform viewers about the risk of severe weather — including tornadoes. On the day we checked recently, eight of 67 offices were down to one balloon launch a day — many of those located west of Chicago. Another three had canceled launches altogether. Not having sufficient weather balloon data is like forecasting our next storm with one eye closed. "The simple logic is that the reason NOAA uses balloons is because they improve the forecast," said Dr. Spinrad. "So therefore, if you take the balloons out, that forecast is going to be degraded." Computer modeling expert Dr. Sharan Majumdar from the University of Miami Rosentiel School of Marine, Atmospheric and Earth Science agrees. He worries about the impact on the 2025 hurricane season, which runs from June through November. "The National Hurricane Center calls for extra observations to supplement the network when there's a hurricane that's approaching," Majumdar said. Majumdar said data show without extra balloon launches that provide three-dimensional structures of the atmosphere surrounding a storm, hurricane track forecasts are less accurate. "The computer models need that, that accuracy of data that the satellites cannot provide," he said. With more people moving to or vacationing along the country's coastlines, that accuracy matters. "The number of people that are just in harm's way, it's always important to keep improving our weather forecasts, and the availability of more observations is only going to improve weather forecasts," Dr. Majumdar said. U.S. Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-California), who represents California's 18th Congressional District in the central part of the state near the coastline, is pushing the Trump Administration for answers. "We have sent six letters … and they refuse to answer them," said Rep. Lofgren. "So not only are they doing irresponsible cuts, but they're hiding what they're doing from the public." U.S. Rep. Zoe Lofgren represents the California 18th Congressional District U.S. House of Representatives Lofgren said she has been searching for bipartisan consensus. "And so far, we have not seen Republican members in the majority willing to join with us to press on this," she said. "I think they're afraid of Trump. I would be more afraid of my constituents being harmed because of those cuts to the weather service." NOAA, again, did not respond to our request for specific staffing information, but did write, "Work is underway to restore services at local forecast offices around the country." However, it doesn't appear that vacant NWS positions will be filled soon, as the place to apply for an open spot, USAJOBS, shows no job openings for the National Weather Service. In the meantime, Dr. Spinrad said NWS employees are doing their best with limited numbers. "Imagine a defense on a college football team playing with only eight players. They're going to get the job done. They're going to work hard," he said. "I don't care how good they are, they can't compete as well. They can't cover every consequence." CBS News Chicago reached out to the Congressional Committee that oversees NOAA and did not hear back. Rep. Lofgren is the ranking Democratic member of that committee. We also reached out to GOP Rep. Darin LaHood (R-Illinois) of Illinois' 16th Congressional District, and did not hear back.
Yahoo
11-03-2025
- Climate
- Yahoo
NOAA to layoff 1,000 more workers at already depleted weather agency: ‘There's going to be pain and a lot of it'
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is bracing for even more devastating cuts to its workforce - with another 1,000 workers set to be let go, officials confirmed to The Independent. The latest firings would affect 10 percent of the agency's remaining workforce, though it's unclear which departments would be hit in the new round after 1,2000 were let go late last month. "NOAA was already understaffed for the mission that is congressionally mandated. And to sustain this initial round of cuts, much less further cuts, much less the fiscal cuts that are in the continuing resolution, there's going to be pain and a lot of it,' an unnamed official who left during the Biden-Trump transition told The Independent. The first layoffs hit the agency at the end of last month, as officials warned about the impacts on the weather forecasting agency. 'Until NOAA's response is provided we won't know which personnel and which offices will be affected, but a cut of that size (1,029 staff) on top of the almost 1,200 already either terminated or issued deferred resignations will have significant impact on NOAA's mission,' former administrator Dr. Richard Spinrad told The Independent in a statement. He repeated the message that even before terminations, retirements or reduction in force that 'NOAA was already understaffed.' Since then, the effects have threatened critical and local forecasting facilities, commercial fisheries and canceled internships. 'Everything that's happened is just making the U.S. less safe and really making the world less safe,' Tom DiLiberto, a climate scientist who had worked at NOAA since 2010, previously told The Independent. '...This affects everybody, no matter where you live.' The former official, who called terminations "capricious, malicious, ill-informed" and "poorly executed,' said they had heard through the grapevine that the Boston, Boise, Idaho, and at least one forecasting center in the middle of the country had been so decimated by buy-outs and terminations that it was unclear if they would be able to sustain staffing of the offices 24/7. The staff were doing their best to provide services with the workers they had. "So it is, like, cutting off your nose to spite your face. Which seems a bit counterintuitive if your goal is really to serve the American people,' said the official. Since the first cuts, there have been reports of some reinstatements at the National Weather Service. The official said they felt like the outcry over the impacts had been successful. "But, it's not just the weather forecasters on the ground. It's the technicians that keep all of the computer power running. It's the folks that operate the satellites, that are also part of NOAA. It's our ocean data buoy network. Our tide and gauge network, NOAA is a great example of how the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. And, you need all of those parts in order to effectively provide the data services and products that the American public has come to expect,' the official said. The official said that if today is meant to be a time when the American public gets more for less, that might not work at NOAA. 'Especially when the elements of Project 2025 have the weather service being privatized. That means you're going to pay for data you get for essential six cents a day now,' the official said. 'And, you're going to pay a whole lot more than six cents a day to get it from the private weather companies." The six cents is how much each American pays to fund NOAA's entire operation per day. "I think that there's a lot of oops-ing going on. And, that may be the way you do it in corporate America,' the official added, 'But, when you're breaking things that are public services, you can't necessarily easily repair or maybe ever repair the things that you have broken.'
