An already active and destructive storm season raises new questions about the impact of recent staffing cuts at the National Weather Service.
In an interview with NBC 5 Investigates, the national president of the union that represents NWS forecasters said recent Trump Administration buyouts and layoffs, combined with long-standing vacancies, could make it harder to adequately staff the weather service offices that issue lifesaving storm alerts.
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WATCH HERE“We want to try and meet the mission; physically we cannot because we don't have enough people,” said JoAnn Becker, president of the National Weather Service Employees Organization (NWSEO).
The union says at least 165 weather service employees accepted early retirement buyouts the Trump administration offered federal workers, and more than 100 probationary employees were fired. About a dozen have since received letters inviting them back, the union said, but it’s not clear if others will be allowed to return.
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SIGN UP Meanwhile, the union said it has been told to prepare for bigger cuts across NOAA, the weather service's parent agency. They don't know yet if forecast offices will be impacted again.
Becker said the recent cuts are devastating. They affect an agency with only about 4,000 workers nationwide, which she said has been understaffed for years.
NBC 5 Investigates has reported for at least a decade on how NWS budget cuts and internal hiring challenges have created hundreds of vacant positions at local forecast offices.
In 2015, we reported the agency had as many as 500 vacant positions nationwide, including about 200 frontline meteorologist jobs.
The NWSEO said the number of vacancies was at least 700 before the most recent cuts.
The union said the forecast office in Fort Worth, which covers the DFW area, has been operating with four out of 27 positions vacant, including two front-line meteorologist slots.
At the National Storm Prediction Center, just up Interstate 35 in Norman, Oklahoma, the union reported one probationary worker had been fired and that there were seven longstanding vacancies.
The union said that eight out of 41 slots at the center, including four forecaster positions, are vacant, leaving a nearly 20% vacancy rate at a critical center that issues tornado forecast guidance nationwide.
Becker worries short staffing leads to burnout as forecasters work more overtime to cover empty positions.
“There is a really grave concern that our offices may not be able to support high-impact events that require all-hands-on-deck,” Becker told NBC 5 Investigates.
Becker teared up as she described the impact of the cuts on the agency’s employees.
“We're a small family in the weather service,” Becker said.
NBC 5 Investigates contacted the National Weather Service, NOAA, and the Commerce Department, which oversees NOAA, to ask about the vacancies and recent cuts, but the agencies did not immediately respond to questions.
“Right now, is not the time to find ourselves short on staffing within the National Weather Service,” said Troy Kimmel, a former Austin television meteorologist who taught meteorology for decades at the University of Texas.
Kimmel said that TV forecasters and government emergency managers would not be able to warn the public as quickly without guidance from weather service offices that cover every county in the country.
“The weather service supplies much of the data; they supply satellite information, radar. It's stuff that we all use, and we have to have,” Kimmel said.
The forecaster's union said it was still gathering the latest staffing numbers from each of the 122 forecast offices nationwide as it determines how well it can sustain 24-7 forecasting in cities affected most.
“This very dedicated workforce, as dedicated as they are, can't make up for these extreme staffing shortages. There's only so much they can do,” Becker said.
Because the recent firings and buyouts largely impacted younger probationary workers and older workers closer to retirement, the union said some offices have been disproportionately affected.
In North Texas, dangerous storms have battered the parts of the area over the past week. On Saturday, storms tore the roof off a hotel in Ellis County and flipped over an RV, killing a man and injuring his family.
Officially spring doesn’t begin until next week.
