For months the alarms have followed on the consequences of the shortcomings of staff and funds on forecasts. The complaint of the County Judge of Kerr: “We don’t have an alert system, we didn’t know that this flood would arrive”
February 28, 2025: «The weather service is in difficulty. The layoffs at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration will make the less reliable meteorological bulletins ». March 1, 2025: «Is the Doge sure you want to fire these people? Elon Musk and his team are endangering the Americans in many ways ». May 19, 2025: «Tornado chaos is a warning. With the approach of the hurricane season, the effects of doge cuts on the US forecast and alert system represent a new threat».
This is only a magazine (The Atlantic), one of the many who in the last six months have warned, unnecessarily, on the inappropriateness of the drastic, linear cuts, against the opinion of scientists, operated by the Elon Musk Doge Authority (never officially authorized by Parliament but so works in the Trump II era) and in charge of one spending review who immediately appeared blind in his hitting everything. “We cut the funds to the change of sex for mice,” Donald Trump laughed, throwing everything in the caciara with the usual media skill, But the fact remains that Doge has not cut thousands of billions as promised (that had to do so the law approved the other, and touched health) but put a series of scientific services in difficulty.
The data collection for the weather, widespread, had suffered cuts and immediately Scientific American He had warned “on the impact on the accuracy of forecasts and public safety due to reduced alert capacity”. Personnel deficiency and cuts had limited the ability of the National Weather Service (federal agency founded in 1870) to issue timely and accurate notices for serious meteorological events such as hurricanes, twist and floods. Former NWS directors had warned that the lack of staff in the offices could lead to “useless losses of human lives” due to delayed or missed notices.
The controversy has already started: several Texas authorities immediately criticized the national meteorological service, such as Kerr’s county judge, Rob Kelly: “We don’t have a alert system, we didn’t know that this flood would arrive.” Nim Kidd, head of the emergency management division: “The NWS at the beginning of the week had foreseen up to 15 cm of rain”. The mayor of Kerrville, Dalton Rice more cautious: “Despite the alarms on the floods, despite all that was happening, there have been some events that happened very quickly”.
The situation will worsen: the blocking of access to DMSP satellites (essential to predict the rapid intensification of storms) imposed by the Pentagon officially for Cybersecurity reasons will start from 31 July. The Democrats are silent yesterday, who as they usually send the scientific community to put their face on it: They are always fearful of appearing like those who exploit national tragedies, with the result that now after the massacres in schools to speak are more than anything else, the Republicans, to ask to arm the teachers, pray, and keep silent.
