Hurricane Season Begins with Trump Gutting the “Gold Standard” Weather Services That Save Lives

Mother Jones illustration; Photo by Emil Cohen

As a native Floridian, the six-month slog of hurricane season that begins June 1 and ends November 30 triggers a certain sense of impending doom. Whether you live by the beach or farther inland, the threat of a storm this time of year is always possible. I’ve experienced several hurricanes at this point, most recently Hurricane Milton last October, which pummeled much of Florida’s Gulf coast with storm surge and winds upwards of 120 mph. Neighborhoods like mine that weren’t in evacuation or flood zones were inundated, damaging homes and businesses. Ours became one of the thousands of households damaged by the Category 3 storm when a massive oak tree toppled on top of my home’s roof. My family wasn’t hurt, which is all that mattered, but the hard reality that no one in Florida is immune during hurricane season became heightened for me and much of my community in Tampa Bay.

My fears only intensified earlier this year when the Trump administration announced it would substantially cut funding to the National Weather Service and its parent agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, slashing hundreds of jobs and crucial research^[2] that would improve forecast predictions at a time when climate change will inevitably fuel larger and deadlier natural disasters. In May, NOAA predicted an “above normal”^[3] hurricane season, but fortunately, it’s been a relatively dormant summer—so far. The closest threat, Hurricane Erin, remained in the Atlantic Ocean largely away from the East Coast.

There’s still plenty of time for a major storm to hit the US, especially since historically September is one of the most active months of the season. So, I went to my local bookstore and picked up a copy of Cloud Warriors: Deadly Storms, Climate Chaos—and the Pioneers Creating a Revolution in Weather Forecasting^[4] by veteran journalist Thomas E. Weber^[5]. He is a former Wall Street Journal columnist and bureau chief, and past executive editor of Time. Weber’s book, published in June, explores the decades of advances in meteorology through the experiences of the people who predict the weather, from tornado chasers to scientists in research labs. Based in New York City, Weber spoke to me on the phone last month about his book and how the federal government’s cuts could shape the future of weather forecasting for years to come. Our interview has been lightly condensed and edited for clarity.

When I was reading the intro to your book, there was a paragraph where you talked about how local officials rely on the weather service for public safety, and that lawmakers might be reluctant to sign on for disruptions regardless of their political background. Given everything we’ve seen this year with the Trump administration’s cuts to NOAA, how has that changed?

I think most people in the weather world were aware that Project 2025^[6] had some very specific goals laid out in terms of NOAA and, within that, the National Weather Service. In some sense, everything that we could have anticipated in terms of the actual moves, we’ve mostly seen come to pass. My hope last year, when writing that, was that local officials, regardless of their partisan stripes, would realize that this is a critical public safety function and try to block any major cuts, especially to the weather service. I think what we have seen is a general reluctance of Republican legislators to block any moves by the administration for fear of having the social media anger of the base turned upon them. And so that hasn’t been good for anything in terms of cuts, including NOAA and the weather service. We did have the news a few weeks back that the National Weather Service was going to hire people^[7] to counteract some of the earlier cuts. It’s not bad news that positions that were cut are now going to be filled, and we have seen these job postings go up. But there’s just the day-to-day disruption of having people, especially some of your most experienced people, leaving your organization. And then, what we’re not going to know for years is the long-term institutional damage.

We’re in the peak of hurricane season, but so far it’s been relatively calm. What are you most watching for this hurricane season in terms of the government’s response to any storms that might make landfall in the US this year?

I think we’re all considering ourselves fortunate that Hurricane Erin stayed so far out to sea. In general, in hurricane forecasting, there’s been tremendous progress in predicting the track. Everyone acknowledges that predicting the intensity, and especially the rapid intensification of hurricanes, is one of the biggest forecasting challenges. I don’t think that reflects anything going on with budget cuts right now. My concern there, though, is we’re squandering our future. We’re squandering our ability to keep getting better with these predictions. You’re seeing research cutbacks. For this season, I think people can feel mostly okay for now, but there isn’t support to make sure that the Hurricane Hunters can do their job flying into these storms and getting the data that goes into the models. The GAO was already calling for the Hurricane Hunters to get more funding and to have a plan to modernize their planes because they need to be doing more flights with these types of storms. All of our seed corn for the future is just being kind of piled up and lit on fire.

We’re talking about federal funding for research and other advances in meteorology. In what ways can states or local governments step up to ensure that some of this funding continues?

One area where states and local governments can step up even more in the future is making sure that they’re prepared for dangerous weather and prepared to monitor forecasts. I visited the New York State Weather Risk Communication Center right when it was opening. It’s at the University at Albany, which has a strong meteorology program, a program in emergency management, and actually has the Albany local office of the National Weather Service located in the same facility that they built there. Experienced meteorologists look at the forecasting that comes out of the federal government every day and try to translate it better for state and local officials. States can try to make sure that they are leveraging all of the information that comes out of forecasts. I’m not sure I see a quick solution for states starting to do separate forecasting. I think the expertise there really is within the National Weather Service. If the forecasting continues to be good, and again, there’s some reassuring news in some of these job restorations, I think a lot of states should take a look at what New York is doing with this center and make sure that the people who need the information get it, and get it in an actionable way.

Speaking of people getting the information, this was one of the parts of your book that really resonated with me as somebody who lives in Florida and sees the complacency of people who refuse to evacuate. You talk a lot about the challenges of disseminating the forecasts. How could communicating that information become more challenging with these federal cuts? What are some of the potential ramifications, especially to vulnerable communities that might have to deal with natural disasters in the next few years?

One very simple thing that can be impacted by cuts within the National Weather Service is putting out forecast information in different languages. There was an AI initiative that would translate forecasts into many languages. It was only relatively recently that even in places like Houston, warnings have been put out by the weather service in Spanish as well as in English. I have some concerns about whether we’re going to go backward on that or not. The information environment also keeps getting more challenging. Weather forecasting has gotten bizarrely politicized because underneath the weather is the climate. Meteorologists I have talked to now feel that they could be attacked if they mention climate change and its connection to major weather.

I’m 58. I grew up in Michigan. When there was a tornado warning, you turned on the radio or you turned on the TV, and your trusted local weather forecaster would tell you if there was a warning. That information environment is very different now, especially with younger people not getting much or even any of their information from those traditional, trusted sources.

You talked to tons of people for this book and embedded with several of them as they were doing their jobs across the country. And it sounds as if you’ve been in touch with some of them in the last few months. Climate change has become a charged issue for years, but did the meteorologists you spoke to ever see their forecasting work becoming as politicized as it has become this year? 

No, not remotely.  I think the thing that no one was prepared for, even people who had read Project 2025 last year, was the possibility that there could just be indiscriminate cuts to a public safety organization, especially the National Weather Service. It is something that other countries all around the world envy. You think of the challenge of forecasting the weather in a place like the United States that has so many different climates and so much land. And you know, the National Weather Service is just the gold standard. I don’t think anyone was prepared for indiscriminate cuts. Even those who expected that there would be budget cuts expected that they would somehow be applied in a way that would respect what the most critical job functions are. Instead, as we’ve seen throughout so many agencies, they just cut whoever they could as quickly as they could. I found most people who work in weather forecasting are all pretty committed to the top-line goal, which is to save lives, protect property, and protect the economy. It’s just a tragedy not to have that work respected.

If you buy a book using our Bookshop link, a small share of the proceeds supports our journalism. ^[8]