The U.S. Is on the Verge of Meteorological Malpractice

7 comments

1. When the country is already committing war crimes….

2. Michelle Nijhuis: “On Tuesday afternoon, the risk of wildfire in northeastern Colorado had risen high enough that Xcel Energy, the state’s largest utility company, announced that it would shut down power in much of the area the following day. Expected high winds, combined with the current dry conditions, meant that a downed electrical line could spark a catastrophe. Local institutions responded by announcing closures yesterday, among them the Boulder, Colorado–based National Center for Atmospheric Research, or NCAR.

   “Shortly after the Xcel announcement, USA Today broke the news that the Trump administration planned to ‘dismantle’ the center. Climate scientists know NCAR as one of the largest weather-and-climate-research institutions in the world; Russell Vought, the director of the Office of Management and Budget, described it as ‘one of the largest sources of climate alarmism in the country.’ NCAR had already reduced its staff in anticipation of drastic budget cuts at the National Science Foundation, which provides about half of the center’s funding. In March, a major NCAR project meant to track hurricanes and other severe storms was canceled after the administration pulled back money appropriated for it. Now efforts to dissolve the center would begin ‘immediately,’ USA Today reported, and would include a full closure of the center’s Mesa Laboratory—whose distinctive rose-hued towers, designed by I. M. Pei, have overlooked the city since the 1960s. (The Office of Management and Budget did not immediately return a request for comment.)

   “On Tuesday night, Antonio Busalacchi, the president of the consortium that operates the center, was in New Orleans at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union along with many of the center’s researchers. Busalacchi issued a brief statement acknowledging the reports but noted that ‘we do not have additional information about any such plan.’ That’s essentially still true: At a press availability at the conference today, Busalacchi said, ‘I don’t want to be facetious, but I don’t know what the best definition of “immediate” means.’ He defended NCAR’s work, which would be more costly if it was broken up, he said, as well as the impartiality of its researchers. ‘We are physical scientists. We’re not political scientists,’ he said.

   “Like many of the institutions and agencies targeted by the Trump administration this year—USAID, the Forest Service, the National Institutes of Health—NCAR is vulnerable in part because so few Americans know what it does, if they’ve heard of it at all. Established in 1960 to advance the field of meteorology, which had flourished during World War II but languished in peacetime, the center was designed to coordinate research on ‘the problems of the atmosphere’ and provide the large-scale computing facilities necessary for that work. It now employs more than 800 researchers and makes its facilities available to thousands more each year.

   “Katharine Hayhoe, a climate scientist at Texas Tech University and the chief scientist of the Nature Conservancy, called NCAR ‘quite literally our global mothership.’ Daniel Swain, a UC Agriculture and Natural Resources climate scientist known for his commentary on extreme-weather events, hosted a ‘rapid response’ livestream yesterday morning. ‘Most academics in the weather and climate world,’ he said, ‘have in some way passed through or connected with the National Center for Atmospheric Research.’ Swain, himself a research partner at NCAR, spoke to his audience from Boulder, warning that the area’s planned power shutoff could bring his report to an abrupt end. He described the administration’s plans for NCAR as ‘a genuinely shocking self-inflicted wound.’”

   Read more: [https://theatln.tc/yMRfH3ej](https://theatln.tc/yMRfH3ej)

3. Thank you for posting.

4. Don’t look up!

5. I can’t take it anymore

6. America is pretty bad.

7. What the F? My brother and his family are in Colorado, are they without power and heat? What the hell is going on?

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