Heads Up New York Schumer gives news about NOAA miscalls on Joaquin

[lovuian]

Sen. Chuck Schumer says the underfunding of hurricane tracking systems may have led to miscalls on Hurricane Joaquin's track along the east coast.

The senator held an event Sunday afternoon in New York City.

http://www.wbng.com/news/state/Schumer-Underfunding-of-hurricane-tracking-systems-330573621.html

I kid you not

“In the era of super storms, accurate weather forecasts are not a luxury – they are a necessity. The information we gather on weather from high above the earth translates into safety on the ground,” said Schumer in a news release. “It is just plain dumb to cut hundreds of millions from our weather satellite system just when catastrophic storms are getting more extreme and more frequent. Hurricane Joaquin is just the latest example of how crucial these satellites are and that’s why I am launching this push to get our weather system adequately funded.”

Schumer said he is pushing Congress to restore the $245 million for NOAA.

[NV Whino]

1. Now, how did I guess the first line of that statement?

[procon]

2. Unbelievable. And many of states hit hardest are Republican strongholds,

so it makes no sense that they would deliberately set out to cause harm to their own states. Unfortunately for all of us, none of the voters who elected the same shortsighted idiots that cut the funding, will ever connect the dots between what their elected reps did to them and the cost to their own communities.

[Doctor_J]

9. that's why at some point they are going to have to be cut off

You're either part of the United states or you're not. They need to decide whether they're in or out.

[tblue37]

3. The Republicans in Congress cut funding for NASA's weather tracking satellites partly

because they provide climate change data.

But also, like Bobby Jindal's sneering about funds for volcano monitoring, the scientifically illiterate yahoos just can't fathom why weather tracking data would be more important than tax cuts for their wealthy donors.

http://scienceprogress.org/2011/03/house-gop-doubles-down-on-cuts-to-weather-hurricane-and-climate-tracking/

"House GOP Still Says Accurate Weather Forecasting and Hurricane Tracking are Luxuries America Can’t Afford:
Latest CR Would Cut Even Deeper into Critical Satellite Observation Programs"

Last month, CAP and Climate Progress reported on House Republicans’ shortsighted attempt to obliterate funding for new environmental monitoring satellites—the sole source of some data for weather and climate forecasters.

On Tuesday, in its latest three-week extension of government spending, the GOP, apparently not content with the depth of its evisceration, upped the ante by voting to cut an additional $115 million from NOAA’s Acquisition account. As we wrote in February after the initial cuts passed the House

At least an 18-month gap in coverage will be unavoidable without adequate funding for new polar-orbiting satellites this year. More troubling, taking an acquisition program offline and then restarting the process at a later date would lead to cost increases of as much as three to five times the amount the government would have to spend for the same product today.

So here’s the choice: Spend $700 million this year for continuous service or $2 billion to $3.5 billion at some point in the future for the same equipment and a guaranteed service interruption.

(SNIP)

[Beartracks]

14. And they'll still claim they're the party of fiscal responsibility.

==================

[Kingofalldems]

4. Too much science. Pat Robertson should call all hurricanes.

[lovuian]

5. "In the Era of SuperStorms"

what's he trying to tell us here


"SuperStorms"......Bigger Badder Storms than Hurricanes....

GOP shouldn't have cut funding to NOAA

[DesMoinesDem]

11. Superstorm is a meaningless nonscientific term meant to scare people.

It has nothing to do with a storm being bigger and badder than a hurricane. Sandy wasn't even a hurricane when it made landfall in the US. Calling this the era of superstorms is embarrassing.

[lovuian]

15. I think Superstorm is the best description for

climate change future storms.....It's a heads up for the future and instead of having funding NOAA gets slashed

[DesMoinesDem]

16. Its not a description of anything. It is a meaningless term used by people who blame climate change

for every storm.

[patricia92243]

6. Was the EU model any more accurate?

[msongs]

7. days ago the far eastern track was listed but considered an outlier. but not discounted

don't recall which model that was.

[NutmegYankee]

10. That was the European Center for Medium-range Weather Forecasting (ECMWF) model.

[lovuian]

8. I don't think NOAA knows for sure what Monday is going to bring

I think Schumer is frustrated



It's a Superstorm all right

[enough]

12. So far NOAA's forecasts for my area on the east coast (Chester County PA, near Wilmington DE)

have been 100% accurate, in spite of the fact that some of the maps showed the storm driving right up into our area.

That is an amazing map, thanks for the post, lovuian.

[starroute]

13. It's not just the satellites -- the buoys are also being allowed to fail

http://www.nature.com/news/el-ni%C3%B1o-monitoring-system-in-failure-mode-1.14582

El Niño monitoring system in failure mode
US budget woes cripple a key mooring array in the tropical Pacific Ocean.
23 January 2014

An ocean-monitoring system that extends across the tropical Pacific is collapsing, depriving scientists of data on a region that influences global weather and climate trends.

Nearly half of the moored buoys in the Tropical Atmosphere Ocean (TAO) array have failed in the past two years, crippling an early-warning system for the warming and cooling events in the eastern equatorial Pacific, known respectively as El Niño and La Niña. Scientists are now collecting data from just 40% of the array.

“It’s the most important climate phenomenon on the planet, and we have blinded ourselves to it by not maintaining this array,” says Michael McPhaden, a senior scientist at the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in Seattle, Washington. McPhaden headed the TAO project before it was transferred out of NOAA’s research arm and into the agency's National Weather Service in 2005.

[lovuian]

17. Update on Joaquin

http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/goes/east/eaus/h5-loop-wv.html

pretty fascinating to watch
Look at the spinning down at Florida

Two hospitals in Charleston have NO water.

University of SC, no water.

[lovuian]

18. Notice the general term East Coast and New Jersey included

http://kosu.org/post/joaquin-churning-toward-bermuda-causes-massive-floods-us#stream/0

"It's not over. We are in the middle of it. We have at least another 24 hours. There is more rain is coming," she said.

Haley emphasized that it's not like a direct hit from a hurricane, which the state has experience with, but

Rain and flood warnings for much of the U.S. East Coast continue through today. The rainfall will reach into the Southeast and the Tennessee Valley with flash-flood threats in several states, including parts of New Jersey, Georgia and North Carolina.

Joaquin is forecast to pass very near Bermuda late tonight or early Monday as a major storm that could do considerable damage.

Joaquin was centered about 125 miles southwest of Hamilton, Bermuda's capital city. The Category 3 storm, with winds of 105 mph, is moving northeast at 15 mph.


Notice the general term EAST COAST