Key data used in hurricane forecasting will be cut by end of July, NOAA says

Hurricane play aft cuts to NOAA

Concerns astir NOAA cuts arsenic U.S. heads into hurricane season 02:28

A outer programme that has historically been a cardinal root of upwind forecasting information volition beryllium discontinued by July 31, arsenic the United States enters highest hurricane season, according to the already resource-strapped National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. 

The national agency, which includes the National Weather Service, initially said past week that it was going to suffer entree to the outer information by June 30. But successful an update posted online connected Monday, NOAA said the deadline to decommission the outer strategy was pushed to July 31, astatine the petition of a apical authoritative astatine NASA.

Operated by the U.S. Department of Defense, the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program has since the 1960s collected biology accusation each time from satellites orbiting Earth, successful bid to supply real-time details astir conditions successful the ambiance and oceans to the military. The information was made disposable to upwind scientists for accepted forecasting purposes, aft being processed by a subdivision of the Navy that focuses connected meteorology and oceanography.

Starting Aug. 1, that naval subdivision volition nary longer process oregon upload outer information to the computing interface wherever meteorologists antecedently accessed it, according to NOAA. 

In an email that the bureau reposted online, the lawman manager of its Office of Satellite and Product Operations said the Navy decided to instrumentality that alteration successful efforts "to mitigate a important cybersecurity risk" but would proceed to administer the information done the extremity of adjacent month.

NOAA spokesperson Kim Doster had called it a "routine process of information rotation and replacement," The Associated Press reported past week. She besides said that remaining information sources "are afloat susceptible of providing a implicit acceptable of cutting-edge information and models that guarantee the gold-standard upwind forecasting the American radical deserve."

NOAA is facing this imminent information cutoff aft losing a important chunk of its unit to layoffs and buyouts earlier this year, stemming from President Trump's initiative to trim authorities spending successful portion by shrinking the national workforce. 

Hurricane play runs done Nov. 30, and NOAA forecasters said successful May that they expected this 1 to beryllium more progressive than an mean year. The play typically reaches its "peak," its astir progressive period, astir August and September.

CBS News has reached retired to NOAA and the Naval Meteorology and Oceanography Command, which oversees the organisation of outer upwind data.

• National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
• United States Navy
• United States Department of Defense