21–30 of 167 posts
>The loss of DMSP comes as Noaa’s weather and climate monitoring services have become critically understaffed this year as Donald Trump’s so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge) initiative has instilled draconian cuts to federal environmental programs. Translation: "We can't actually say this was DOGE, so we're going to imply it using emotionally charged words, and 90% of folks with bad media literacy…
“Researchers say the satellites themselves are operating normally and do not appear to have suffered any errors that would physically prevent the data from continuing to be collected and distributed, so the abrupt data halt might have been an intentional decision.” Wait, the U.S. aren’t even going to try selling the satellites? We’re just scrapping them?
That claim does not seem justified. > 2016 failure of DMSP 19 without replacement[edit] On 11 February 2016, a power failure left both the command-and-control subsystem and its backup without the ability to reach the satellite's processor, according to the U.S. Air Force Space Command investigation released in July 2016 that also announced that DMSP 5D-3/F19 was considered to be 'lost'. The satellite's data can still…
Generally, you use space hardware until it dies, which is hopefully well beyond the design life.
>The loss of DMSP comes as Noaa’s weather and climate monitoring services have become critically understaffed this year as Donald Trump’s so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge) initiative has instilled draconian cuts to federal environmental programs. Translation: "We can't actually say this was DOGE, so we're going to imply it using emotionally charged words, and 90% of folks with bad media literacy…
I don’t understand what you’re complaining about here. Lying?
Now media gets a free pass on certain lies because Bad Man Bad, and (evidently) people aren't even allowed to point out the lie.
Hint: when the media can make up whatever they want about someone, they can quickly twist perception to make anyone into the Bad Man.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don’t understand what you’re complaining about here. Lying?
Yes, when the media lies it's bad . People used to understand that fact. Now media gets a free pass on certain lies because Bad Man Bad, and (evidently) people aren't even allowed to point out the lie. Hint: when the media can make up whatever they want about someone, they can quickly twist perception to make anyone into the Bad Man.
And now the current funding request enacts a ~30% funding cut.
I'm not sure the factual issue you're seeing. Is it that the statement wasn't definitive enough in saying that DOGE apparently was a large part of instituting these cuts?
(Yes, I know OPM implemented many of these programs, but they're apparently at DOGE's request, named after the "Fork in the Road" initiative at Twitter, using data gathered by DOGE IT staffers, &c. If we give credit for any cuts, we have to give them credit for significant cuts at NOAA.)
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don’t understand what you’re complaining about here. Lying?
Yes, when the media lies it's bad . People used to understand that fact. Now media gets a free pass on certain lies because Bad Man Bad, and (evidently) people aren't even allowed to point out the lie. Hint: when the media can make up whatever they want about someone, they can quickly twist perception to make anyone into the Bad Man.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don’t understand what you’re complaining about here. Lying?
Yes, when the media lies it's bad . People used to understand that fact. Now media gets a free pass on certain lies because Bad Man Bad, and (evidently) people aren't even allowed to point out the lie. Hint: when the media can make up whatever they want about someone, they can quickly twist perception to make anyone into the Bad Man.
It's part of the Administration's war on ... Florida?
It could help lower insurance costs.
If you know your car's engine is going to need replaced after exactly 100,000 miles, you know to save up for a new engine or a new car - and you know how long you have to save, so you can precisely set aside an appropriate figure every month.
If you know your car's engine will die sometime within the next 15,000 miles, you know you need to start saving up immediately, but b/c you don't know when in the next 15,000 miles you have to rush your saving.
If you have no idea when your car's engine is going to die, you are likely to end up dead engine and little to no savings.
>The loss of DMSP comes as Noaa’s weather and climate monitoring services have become critically understaffed this year as Donald Trump’s so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge) initiative has instilled draconian cuts to federal environmental programs. Translation: "We can't actually say this was DOGE, so we're going to imply it using emotionally charged words, and 90% of folks with bad media literacy…
The article is saying it was DOGE. DOGE directly attacked our hurricane-forecasting capacity [1]. OMB, i.e. Vought, continues that attack [2].
Given the top three states by hurricane risk voted for Trump in ‘24 [3][4] this should make for an entertaining hurricane season. (Particularly if both a red and blue state get hit and request federal assistance.)
[1] https://apnews.com/article/national-weather-service-layoffs-...
[2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/NOAA_under_the_second_presid...
[3] https://www.realtor.com/news/trends/states-most-at-risk-for-...
[4] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_United_States_president...
“Researchers say the satellites themselves are operating normally and do not appear to have suffered any errors that would physically prevent the data from continuing to be collected and distributed, so the abrupt data halt might have been an intentional decision.” Wait, the U.S. aren’t even going to try selling the satellites? We’re just scrapping them?
That claim does not seem justified. > 2016 failure of DMSP 19 without replacement[edit] On 11 February 2016, a power failure left both the command-and-control subsystem and its backup without the ability to reach the satellite's processor, according to the U.S. Air Force Space Command investigation released in July 2016 that also announced that DMSP 5D-3/F19 was considered to be 'lost'. The satellite's data can still…
That doesn't accurately capture the reason why there's outrage here. In the weather community, we're constantly thinking through contingencies because a great deal of things are out of our control - and we rely on aging infrastructure, much of which is already flaky to begin with.
Data outages and data loss happens. But there's no reason to allow a _preventable_ data loss to occur. The DMSP data is still being collected, it's just not being distributed downstream. And the decision to make this policy change was seemingly done rapidly and with no input or feedback from the user community of this data - both inside and outside the federal government.
There's no reason to turn off the spigot of this data. And there certainly is no reason to do so abruptly and with virtually no notice. As a consequence, the community is limited in its ability to adapt. For instance, it would take time (and money) to spin up more hurricane hunting resources to replace the overpass data that the SSMI/S instrument captures. Some private companies operate PMW satellite constellations and we could accelerate the acquisition of these data, but there are limited (read: none) federal mechanisms to do this and due to vertical integration in the weather industry, the operators of these constellations may not actually be inclined to do so - and certainly won't do so on the cheap, especially for the federal government.
So this isn't hyperbole. This is a really big deal. It might not be visible to you, but there is a panic and scramble occurring in the weather community to figure out what to do from here.
And for the record - yes, the same panic would happen if the DMSP satellites failed suddenly due to natural causes. But this current situation could've - and should've - been prevented.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The intent is to disable the capability to ignore the data. If you allow access to someone else, you're not preventing the data capture and dissemination. If the data shows hurricanes are intensifying in strength due to climate change, and you no longer capture the data, you can say with a straight face "No it isn't and you can't prove it." How large systems with exposure to these places (insurance, capital markets)…
I think it’s even more nefarious than that. They can attack other countries that claim intensifying climate and weather scenarios by saying their data is biased while claiming to have the best data in the world but not share for national security reasons. While this may seem like something unbelievable to you or me it is easily eaten up by their supporters who love propaganda. Like, my republican parents are convince…