After Trump administration job cuts, nearly half of the National Weather Service's forecast offices have 20% vacancy rates—twice that of just a decade ago—as severe weather chugs across the nation's heartland, per data obtained by the AP. Detailed vacancy data for all 122 weather field offices show eight offices are missing more than 35% of their staff, including those in Arkansas where tornadoes and torrential rain hit this week, according to statistics crowdsourced by more than a dozen NWS employees. Experts said vacancy rates of 20% or higher amount to critical understaffing, and 55 of the 122 sites reach that level.
The weather offices issue routine daily forecasts, but also urgent up-to-the-minute warnings during dangerous storm outbreaks such as the tornadoes that killed seven people this week and "catastrophic" flooding that's continuing through the weekend. The weather service this week has logged at least 75 tornado and 1,277 severe weather preliminary reports. "It's a crisis situation," said Brad Colman, past president of the American Meteorological Society. "I am deeply concerned that we will inevitably lose lives as a result of the added risk due to this short-staffing." The employees' data, which goes back to 2015, showed that in March 2015 the overall vacancy rate was 9.3%. Ten years later, as of March 21, it was 19%.
The vacancies go beyond meteorologists who do forecasts. Twenty-three offices are without the meteorologist-in-charge who oversees the office. Sixteen have vacancies in the crucial warning coordination meteorologist job, which makes sure emergency officials and the public prepare for oncoming weather disasters. The Houston office, with a 30% vacancy rate, is missing both those top positions, per the data and the office's own website. One weather service field office chief, who asked not to be IDed due to fears of job loss, said the lack of technicians to fix radar and other needed equipment could be critically dangerous. "People are bending over backwards" to cope with the lack of staffing, the chief meteorologist said. "The burden is going to kill us." The NWS didn't immediately respond to a request for comment. More here.
(More
National Weather Service stories.)
,
uBlock 
,
and
Ghostery 
)
