WASHINGTON – The Trump administration is launching another job cut (more than 1,000) in the country’s weather, marine and fishing agencies.
On Tuesday, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration began plans to fire 10% of the current workforce, with people inside and outside the agency demanding anonymity due to fear of retaliation. The numbers were presented to NOAA employees and the manager was asked to submit the name of the layoff position to the agency headquarters.
Three former NOAA staffers (two former political appointees in the Biden administration) spoke regularly with managers at older agencies and used the same number for upcoming recruitment: 1,029, 10% of 1,0290. They still spoke with multiple people at NOAA, and current agency workers detailed the cuts that the manager explained to the employees.
While most people know about NOAA and its daily weather forecasts, agents also monitor and warn hurricanes, tornadoes, floods and tsunamis, manage the country’s fisheries, operate ocean sanctuaries, provide navigation information to vessels, and observe climate and ocean changes. The agency also serves to warn you about avalanches and space weather that can damage the electrical grid. It helps in responding to disasters, including oil spills.
The new cuts came after an earlier round of Trump’s firing, encouraging retirement at NOAA and also encouraged the removal of almost all new employees last month. After this upcoming round of cuts, NOAA has eliminated about one of four jobs since President Donald Trump took office in January.
“This is not government efficiency,” said Rick Spinrad, a former NOAA administrator. “That’s the first step towards eradication. There’s no way to create these kinds of cuts without removing or violating mission features.”
Cut was ordered without specific guidance from the Trump administration, which worse yet, even worse.
NOAA spokeswoman Monica Allen said the agency’s policy is not to discuss internal human resources issues, but NOAA “will continue to provide weather information, forecasts and warnings based on our public safety mission.”
NOAA has already stopped releases of several weather balloons that gather important observations of forecasts at two locations in Albany, New York (Gray, Albany, New York).
This is all because we expect the system of intense storms to move through the central and southern parts of the country later this week with a few days of explosions with strong tornadoes, hail and harmful winds that are expected to have.
The weather forecast has gotten worse and “people start watching this very quickly,” warned former NOAA chief scientist Craig McLean. He said it would also limit how many fishermen commercial fishermen can catch.
In addition to all unemployment, cuts in research grants to universities will make it difficult for the US to continue improving weather forecasts and better monitor what’s going on with the planet, McLean said.
“People are quietly watching the US decline as technical leaders,” McLean said. “The US has reached the moon, but our weather forecast is not the biggest.”
AP Science Writer Seth Borenstein
