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Officials in Texas are casting blame on the National Weather Service (NWS) for failing to forecast catastrophic flooding that has killed 24 people.

NWS was among the government agencies targeted by the Trump administration in its effort to gut the federal bureaucracy, losing approximately 600 staffers.

After the cuts, the agency—which was already understaffed—began to prepare to offer “degraded” forecasting services, facing “severe shortages” of meteorologists, according to an internal document obtained by The New York Times in April.

  • Scotty_Trees@lemmy.worldEnglish
    0·
    1 month ago

    Honestly, one of the best independent news from Texas is the Texas Tribune, fully funded by it’s readers and not owned by a billionaire. Been following them for a few years (don’t even live in Texas, but it’s good to know what their GOP is doing because their policies could always spread), and have found their reporting to be excellent. Please give them a try. Also fuck Cruz and Abbot and the GOP in general…

    https://www.texastribune.org/

  • KnitWit@lemmy.worldEnglish
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    1 month ago

    Don’t fall for it. While the NWS is definitely being gutted, there was nothing wrong with their reporting. They issued proper preliminary reports and warnings leading up to the tragic event. This wasn’t an issue of not being forewarned, it was an issue of a river rising over twenty feet in a rapid timeframe. These officials are once again denigrating scientists, and not once did they mention increasing funding for these services.

    • mysticpickle@lemmy.caOPEnglish
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      1 month ago

      For instance, directly under Vesper at the local NWS office is a key position – warning coordination meteorologist (WCM) – that has remained vacant since April. The role was most recently held by longtime employee Paul Yura, who took an early retirement package offered to agency workers as the administration worked to reduce the budget and personnel number at the NWS and its parent agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

      Yura, who KXAN recently reported spent more than half of his 32-year career at the local NWS office, gained tremendous experience understanding local weather patterns while ensuring timely warnings get disseminated to the public in a multitude of ways. The importance of his role as WCM cannot be understated.

      https://www.kxan.com/investigations/federal-forecast-concerns-surface-in-texas-deadly-flooding-debate/

      • KnitWit@lemmy.worldEnglish
        0·
        1 month ago

        That’s not a part of this article… this article starts with the first paragraph, followed in paragraph 3 and five, which all do more to disparage the forecast than mention an uthing about lack of dissemination (who the person you’re quite would be referring to. This is another hit piece disguised as something else.

        Officials in Texas are casting blame on the National Weather Service (NWS) for failing to forecast catastrophic flooding that has killed 24 people…

        “The original forecast that we received Wednesday from the National Weather Service predicted 3-6 inches of rain in the Concho Valley and 4-8 inches in the Hill Country,” said Texas Emergency Management Chief W. Nim Kidd at a press conference Friday. “The amount of rain that fell at this specific location was never in any of those forecasts.”…

        Dalton Rice, the city manager for Kerrville, Texas—who also spoke at the press conference—said that the catastrophic flash flooding happened because the skies “dumped more rain than what was forecasted” on two of the river’s forks….

    • shalafi@lemmy.worldEnglish
      0·
      1 month ago

      Suspected as much. NOAA and the NWS aren’t falling off a cliff this fast. They’ll get there!

    • facelessbs@lemmy.worldEnglish
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      1 month ago

      I read in one of the recent articles that there was plans to put in a sirens for flooding because it was so common on that particular river but it was struck down because of cost.

  • BigMacHole@sopuli.xyzEnglish
    0·
    1 month ago

    Who CARES if Trump just KILLED a bunch of Kids in Texas in an EXTREMELY PREDICTABLE way! These are REPUBLICANS! When have REPUBLICANS EVER done Anything to Help Children?

  • Lucky_777@lemmy.worldEnglish
    0·
    1 month ago

    Ohhhhh. Some harsh words Trump and his ilk don’t care about. These Texas Republicans will just fall in line as usual. Just like the Republican senators did. Fuck Republicans.

  • Captain Aggravated@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
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    1 month ago

    I took meteorology in college, the thing is I’m trained to read weather data that has been gathered from all the stations and radars and satellites. Without all that I can look out the window and tell you if its raining.

  • Kate-ay@lemmy.worldEnglish
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    1 month ago

    The forecast was good. Don’t spread misinformation and let Texas officials off the hook for not evacuating the area.

    • ayyy@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      0·
      1 month ago

      Who? The people who have consistently denied climate change and weather forecasting leading to a completely avoidable tragedy?

          • Kaboom@reddthat.comBannedEnglish
            0·
            1 month ago

            No one is killing illegal immigrant kids. That’s just some stupid circle jerk you guys have going on.

            • ayyy@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
              0·
              1 month ago

              Ah so when reality pokes holes in your flawed world view you just reject reality. Got it 👍

                • ayyy@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
                  0·
                  1 month ago

                  What the holy fucking shit is wrong with you? Did you seriously pop in here trying to pretend for a second to be some kind of holy pious victim and then immediately claim the only way a state murders is with gas chambers? How do you live with yourself? You are exactly the evil monster you claim to reject. What a disaster of a person.