Research and developments It is a blog for brief updates that provide context for the burst of news about law and changes in policies that affect science and scientists today.
February 27, the Trump Administration fired hundreds of employees of the Oceanic and Atmospheric National Administration (NOA). Among the dismissed were two flight directors for NOAA hurricane hunters, a loss that threatens to worsen the quality of hurricane forecasts before the Atlantic hurricane season.
“Hurricane hunters fly active storms to collect data used for time forecasts.” wrote Jeff Masters at Yale Climate Connections. Masters served as Hurricane Hunter flight director from 1986 to 1990. The NOAA hurricane hunter program operates three planes. Airplanes fly at least twice a day during significant hurricane threats and 24/7 during an active hurricane. The data collected in these flights are used to forecast wind speeds, rain potential and hurricane tracks, information that is essential to save lives.
A flight director is a meteorologist who guarantees the safety of the mission from a meteorological perspective. Each flight from Hurricane Hunter needs a flight director, Masters explained. NOAA generally has eight flight crews and, therefore, eight flight directors. A loss of two flight directors constitutes a 25% reduction in NOAA CAPACITY.
In addition to NOAA, the Air Force also maintains a fleet of 10 aircraft of Hurricane Hunter, and those have not yet been affected by the staff cuts. However, the data provided by Air Force Craft can be of lower quality than those collected by NOAA hurricane hunters, so NOAA cuts can lead to less precise hurricane forecasts.
“We should not surprise ourselves if there are more staff exhaustion before the hurricane season,” Masters wrote. “I know that if I still had my former job as a flight director for NOAA hurricane hunters, worries about my job security would make me look for a new job.”
“Kimberly Mrs. Cartier (@Atrakimcartier.bsky.social), Personnel writer
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