Trump has unleashed a woefully unprepared NWS and FEMA on us just days before the start of hurricane season.

[Tonk]

Hurricane season starts in a few days, and NOAA, NWS, and FEMA are all unprepared for the summer. Hidden away in FEMA, the USFA is also unprepared and short-staffed for the fire season in the West and the Pacific NW.

Doge and Trump have kneecapped the agencies tasked with keeping the population safe, sometimes advising evacuations, which is eliminated as well. So many people will be hurt and suffer because of the MAGA stupidity and cruelty that permeate Washington.

:

Jeff Masters has all the ugliness writing in Yale Climate Connections.

The National Hurricane Center unprepared

The greatest data loss is in the Midwest U.S., which will cause significantly degraded forecasts of hurricanes making landfall along the U.S. Gulf and Atlantic coasts in some situations. It is difficult to quantify the exact degradation, since the researchers needed to perform the “data denial” studies that could inform us have been laid off or are stretched too thin to do the research needed.

While we can expect that the National Hurricane Center will order special balloon launches in the case of a landfalling hurricane, it is questionable whether local National Weather Service offices will have the staff to comply. (And note that balloon launches are often canceled for unanticipated reasons, such as maintenance issues, thunderstorms nearby making it unsafe to do the launches, etc.) Because of the loss of balloon data in 2025, the size of the NHC cone will likely be too small in some situations, giving people overconfidence in the accuracy of hurricane forecasts. Such overconfidence can result in delayed evacuation decisions and failure to take adequate measures to protect lives and property.

FEMA unprepared

When Hurricanes Helene and Milton – both made more destructive by climate change – devastated the Southeast last fall, workers at the Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA, oversaw the government’s effort to rescue survivors and aid the recovery. FEMA has been key, too, in bolstering the country’s long-term resilience efforts, such as elevating flood-prone homes and installing drainage works.

But according to a May 15 report from CNN, an internal agency review prepared at the direction of new acting FEMA Administrator David Richardson said, “As FEMA transforms to a smaller footprint, the intent for this hurricane season is not well understood. Thus FEMA is not ready.”

According to the CNN story, FEMA “has lost roughly 30% of its full-time staff to layoffs and DOGE buyouts, including some of its most experienced and knowledgeable senior leadership.” Furthermore, Trump officials are discussing sharply raising the threshold for states to qualify for federal disaster assistance, and both Trump and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem have advocated drastically shrinking FEMA or eliminating it.

SCOOP: Less than two weeks before the start of hurricane season, the head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) rescinded the agency’s strategic plan, which includes a document that guides agency priorities when responding to disasters, WIRED has learned.

— WIRED (@wired.com) 2025-05-21T19:47:27.483Z

FEMA is ending door-to-door canvassing in disaster areas.

As it shifts responsibility for recovery efforts to local authorities, FEMA workers will stop knocking on doors to provide aid to survivors in disaster areas.

grist.org/politics/fem...

#FEMA #Disaster #Storm #Climate #Environment

— Grist (@grist.org) 2025-05-22T16:41:46.820Z

Houston, Texas: 44% understaffed (11 of 25 positions vacant)
Miami, Florida: 25% understaffed (six of 24 positions)
Key West, Florida: 19% understaffed (four of 21 positions)
Tampa Bay, Florida: 29% understaffed (seven of 24 positions, including their meteorologist-in-charge)
Jacksonville, Florida: 9% understaffed (two of 23 positions, which happen to be two of the top three leadership positions)
Charleston, South Carolina: 22% understaffed (five of 22 positions)
Wilmington, North Carolina: 21% understaffed (five of 24 positions)
Newport, North Carolina: 14% understaffed (three of 22 positions)
Wakefield, Virginia: 0% understaffed (Zero of 22 positions)
Boston, Massachusetts: 19% understaffed (five of 26 positions)
New Orleans, Louisiana: no general staff info given, but one leadership position was unfilled: Science & Operations Officer
Lake Charles, Louisiana: 15% understaffed (three of 20 positions, reported by Washington Post)
Corpus Christi, Texas: 11% understaffed (two of 19 positions)
Brownsville, Texas: 9% understaffed (two of 23 positions)
San Juan, Puerto Rico: 21% understaffed (five of 24 positions)
Honolulu, Hawaii: 10% understaffed (three of 29 positions)

If you live in fire country.

U.S. Fire Administration (USFA) From February:

I have read numerus firsthand reports from impacted NIOSH and NFA workers, all of whom asked to remain anonymous. While I recognize we will all have to share in the pain of budget balancing, I’m quite confident that cutting firefighter safety and training programs to the bone will not resonate well nor result in positive outcomes. The NIOSH, National Firefighter Registry and NFA cuts will impact firefighter safety for years to come. With respect to NIOSH’s firefighter safety staff alone, they are now reportedly down to two investigators to perform investigations for the agency’s trauma team.

Further evidence of the policy upheavals manifests in program cancellations that appear to be related to the Executive Order directing agencies to remove all references and programs that may be considered DEI initiatives. For example, the U.S. Fire Administration’s National Fire Academy announced cancellation of the National Weekend, sponsored by Women in Fire, which had been scheduled for May 17 and 18, 2025, at the National Emergency Training Center in Emmitsburg, Maryland. Additionally, the U.S. Forest Service announced cancellation of the annual spring bootcamp for women who are interested in becoming wildland firefighters.

Whether it is training, grants management, wildland management, disaster response, CMS funding and management, firefighter death investigations or any number of other support functions, the consequences of these terminations is yet to be determined. I can assure you, however, that the local fire service will bear the brunt of the impact.

Another program bites the dust - just got this email this morning that "the U.S. Fire Administration (USFA) can no longer support the Emergency Management and Response Information Sharing & Analysis Center (EMR-ISAC) at this time".

Been a subscriber since 2008. We are living in crazy times.

— Big Mike (@big-mikes.bsky.social) 2025-05-28T13:16:16.252Z

[Irish_Dem]

1. Trump is not interested in saving American lives or preventing suffering and hardship.

[Blues Heron]

2. Musk/Trump have really damaged our safety as a country.

[synni]

3. The tornado season is just as important

Hurricanes are slow-moving. Tornadoes form suddenly, and you only have minutes of warning, not days (like a hurricane).

I wish people would stop talking about *just* hurricanes, and talk about tornadoes, too. I survived a major tornado outbreak, from a supercell that left destruction in multiple states.

*Both* kinds of severe weather are deadly.

[Tonk]

4. I've written on both.

[dem4decades]

5. Red states, FAFO time. Too bad we all have to pay for their stupidity.