Tag: NOAA

These 7 details from the damning Sharpiegate report show it was a dark omen of Trump’s destructive potential

AlterNet logoWhile it was dismissed by some as an overhyped media obsession, the presidential scandal that has come to be known as “Sharpiegate” was, in fact, an early warning sign of the truly catastrophic potential of Donald Trump.

The story arose out of Hurricane Dorian, which began its deliberate march up toward the East Coast of the United States in late August and early September of 2019. It ravaged the Bahamas, and officials feared the damage it could inflict stateside. But then came a Trump tweet on Sept. 1, and later comments to reporters, in which he warned that Alabama was in the storm’s path. He said it was among the states “most likely be hit (much) harder than anticipated.”

This wasn’t true, and his false claim set off a series of troubling events. Most infamously, he later showed a weather forecast map that appeared to have been altered with a Sharpie to falsely extend the storm’s path into Alabama — a truly absurd and ridiculous spectacle that earned the president widespread derision. But his tweet also led to the NOAA’s National Weather Service office in Birmingham to tweet out contradictory information, telling readers: “Alabama will NOT see any impacts from #Dorian.” That tweet sparked fury within the administration, and the Commerce Department later rebuked the office in a contentious statement. Continue reading.

New emails show how President Trump roiled NOAA during Hurricane Dorian

Washington Post logoA trove of documents released on Friday evening provides the clearest glimpse yet into how President Trump’s inaccurate statements, altered forecast map and tweets regarding Hurricane Dorian’s forecast path rattled top officials along with rank and file scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in September.

The documents, released in response to Freedom of Information Act requests from The Washington Post and other media outlets, show that the No. 2 official at the agency, Ret. Rear Adm. Tim Gallaudet, claimed that neither he nor acting administrator Neil Jacobs approved a controversial unsigned statement that a NOAA spokesperson issued on Sept. 6. That statement criticized the National Weather Service forecast office in Birmingham for a tweet that contradicted Trump’s inaccurate assertion from Sept. 1, in which the president claimed that Alabama “will most likely be hit (much) harder than anticipated” from the Category 5 storm.

The statement was widely interpreted within NOAA’s National Weather Service as contradicting an accurate forecast because of political pressure from the White House and the Department of Commerce. Continue reading.

Democrats ramp up calls to investigate NOAA

The Hill logoDemocratic lawmakers are ramping up requests for investigations into why officials at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) reprimanded their own scientists for contradicting President Trump’s tweet on Hurricane Dorian.

Four Democratic lawmakers are now calling for probes into reports that the White House played a hand in reprimanding NOAA staff at the agency’s Birmingham, Ala., office for tweeting that Alabama would not be affected by the hurricane. That kind of involvement would be seen as a politicization of science.

On Wednesday, the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology launched a congressional inquiry into the circumstances that led NOAA to issue an unsigned statement last week that appeared to rebuke its own scientists who contradicted Trump’s claims about Dorian’s path.

View the complete September 11 article by Miranda Green on The Hill website here.

Trump pushed staff to deal with NOAA tweet that contradicted his inaccurate Alabama hurricane claim, officials say

Washington Post logoLawmakers, Commerce Department launch investigations into NOAA’s decision to back the president over forecasters.

President Trump told his staff that the nation’s leading weather forecasting agency needed to correct a statement that contradicted a tweet the president had sent wrongly claiming that Hurricane Dorian threatened Alabama, senior administration officials said.

That led White House acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney to call Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross to tell him to fix the issue, according to the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk publicly about the issue. Trump had complained for several days that forecasters from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration contradicted his Sept. 1 Alabama tweet, the officials said.

Mulvaney then called Ross, who was traveling in Greece, and told him that the agency needed to fix things immediately, the officials said. Mulvaney did not instruct Ross to threaten any firings or offer punitive actions. But Ross then called NOAA acting administrator Neil Jacobs, the officials said. That led to an unusual, unsigned statement from NOAA released on Sept. 6 that backed Trump’s false claim about Alabama and admonished the National Weather Service’s Birmingham, Ala., division for speaking “in absolute terms” that there would not be “any” impacts from Dorian in the state. The Weather Service is an arm of NOAA, which is an agency within the Commerce Department. The New York Times first reported some elements of the White House involvement.

View the complete September 11 article by Andrew Freedman, Josh Dawsey, Juliet Eilperin and Jason Samenow on The Washington Post website here.

NOAA leader, in Alabama speech, says ‘weather shouldn’t be a partisan issue’

Washington Post logoAmid a controversy over his agency’s response to President Trump’s tweet, Neil Jacobs assures the audience full of meteorologists that no one’s job is at risk.

HUNTSVILLE, Alabama — The acting administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Neil Jacobs, defended his agency at a major weather industry conference on Tuesday morning in an emotional speech, as controversy swirls over how agency officials responded to President Trump’s inaccurate claim on Sept. 1 that Alabama “would most likely be hit (much) harder than anticipated” by Hurricane Dorian.

Jacobs defended the agency’s unusual, unsigned statement released on Sept. 6, which backed Trump’s false claim about Alabama and admonished the Weather Service’s Birmingham division for speaking “in absolute terms.”

“I have the utmost respect for what you do because I understand how difficult numerical weather prediction is, and how even more complicated conveying risk to the public is. The purpose of the NOAA statement was to clarify the technical aspects of the potential impacts of Dorian,” Jacobs said. “What it did not say, however, is that we understand and fully support the good intent of the Birmingham weather office, which was to calm fears and support public safety.”

View the complete September 10 article by Kate Harrison Belz and Andrew Freedman on The Washington Post website here.

Commerce chief threatened firings at NOAA after Trump’s hurricane tweets, sources say

WASHINGTON – The secretary of commerce threatened to fire top employees at the federal scientific agency responsible for weather forecasts last Friday after the agency’s Birmingham, Alabama, office contradicted President Donald Trump’s claim that Hurricane Dorian might hit Alabama, according to three people familiar with the discussion.

That threat led to an unusual, unsigned statement later that Friday by the agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, disavowing the National Weather Service’s position that Alabama was not at risk. The reversal caused widespread anger within the agency and drew accusations from the scientific community that the National Weather Service, which is part of NOAA, had been bent to political purposes.

NOAA’s statement on Friday is now being examined by the Commerce Department’s Office of Inspector General, according to documents reviewed by the New York Times, and employees have been asked to preserve their files. NOAA is a division of the Commerce Department.

View the complete September 10 article by Peter Baker, Christopher Flavelle and Lisa Friedman from The New York Times on The StarTribune website here.

NOAA disavows National Weather Service tweet that contradicted Trump

The Hill logoThe National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) released a statement Friday evening disavowing a days-old tweet from the National Weather Service that contradicted President Trump over the reach of Hurricane Dorian.

The NOAA statement, which was unsigned and posted to the agency’s website on Friday, said that the “Birmingham National Weather Service’s Sunday morning tweet spoke in absolute terms that were inconsistent with probabilities from the best forecast products available at the time.”

“From Wednesday, August 28, through Monday, September 2, the information provided by NOAA and the National Hurricane Center to President Trump and the wider public demonstrated that tropical-storm-force winds from Hurricane Dorian could impact Alabama,” the NOAA statement reads.

View the complete September 6 article by Justine Coleman on The Hill website here.

NOTE:  As the government continues to collapse under the Trump abuses, we, the American people become more in a position of risk. If we can’t trust information coming from the scientists at organizations like NOAA, how can we know what we need to do to keep our families, our businesses and ourselves safe?

Company led by Trump nominee was rife with harassment, including groping and kissing, report says

A federal workplace investigation found rampant sexual harassment and retaliation at AccuWeather, a federal contractor, including groping, touching and kissing of subordinates without consent. AccuWeather’s chief executive at the time of the allegations and investigation, Barry Myers, was tapped by President Trump to lead the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The detailed results of the investigation, not previously reported, were compiled last year by the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs and obtained by The Washington Post. It determined that AccuWeather, under Myers, fostered a culture ripe for sexual harassment, turned a blind eye to allegations of egregious conduct and retaliated against those who complained.

According to the report, the investigation was prompted by a complaint filed Sept. 6, 2016, alleging a “hostile work environment and termination based on sexual orientation and sex.” Many other complaints from AccuWeather employees followed.

View the complete April 12 article by Michael brice-Saddler on The Washington Post website here.

NOAA scientists debunk Trump’s ‘global waming’ tweets with a cartoon

Cartoon tweeted out bu NOAA scientists Tuesday morning. Credi: NOAA

“Winter storms don’t prove that global warming isn’t happening.”

U.S. government climate scientists took the unprecedented step of tweeting out a rebuttal to President Donald Trump’s recent tweets implying that winter storms and cold weather in the U.S. somehow disprove global warming.

“Large parts of the Country are suffering from tremendous amounts of snow and near record setting cold,” Trump tweeted out last week. “Wouldn’t be bad to have a little of that good old fashioned Global Warming right now!”

On Monday evening, he tweeted again: “What the hell is going on with Global Waming? [sic] Please come back fast, we need you!”

View the complete January 29 article by Joe Romm on the ThinkProgress website here.

White House proposes steep budget cut to leading climate science agency

The following article by Steven Mufson, Jason Samenow and Brady Dennis was posted on the Washington Post website March 3, 2017:

The Trump administration is seeking to slash the budget of one of the government’s premier climate science agencies by 17 percent, delivering steep cuts to research funding and satellite programs, according to a four-page budget memo obtained by The Washington Post.

The proposed cuts to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration would also eliminate funding for a variety of smaller programs, including external research, coastal management, estuary reserves and “coastal resilience,” which seeks to bolster the ability of coastal areas to withstand major storms and rising seas. Continue reading “White House proposes steep budget cut to leading climate science agency”