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Topics: Donald Trump, Elon Musk, Weather, US News
Joe Yates
Topics: Donald Trump, Elon Musk, Weather, US News
As the Trump administration ploughs on with its plans to drastically reduce the federal wage bill, a specialist program assisting the US with natural disasters has become the latest to be affected.
The National Weather Service (NWS) was forced to cancel its incident meteorologist training due to 'short staffing', following a drastic reduction of its travel expenses, according to an email seen by The Hill.
A close source to the publication in the agency expressed their concern that due to the session being cancelled, newly recruited incident meteorologists face a delay in being certified.
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It means the organization would have less staffers readily available to respond to natural disasters, like the recent wildfires that torched Los Angeles, creating even more of a strain on the workforce.
So, what does an incident meteorologist do?
The NWS explain: "Incident Meteorologists (IMETs) help keep the fire crews safe by enabling responders to plan operations taking into account one of the most variable aspects of the incident — the weather.
"They are NWS Forecasters who have been specially trained and certified to provide weather support at a fire location.
"IMETs keep firefighters safe by interpreting weather information, assessing its effect on the fire and communicating it to fire crews."
Adding: "Once on-site, IMETs become key members of the incident command teams and provide continuous meteorological support for the duration of the incident."
Incident meteorologists receive 250 hours of training to enable them to accurately provide weather information to incident managers, at wildfires for instance, and thus keep everyone involved safe - and the public too.
It comes as President Donald Trump received an order today (March 13) by a US District Court judge to rehire thousands of federal workers he axed on the grounds of a 'lie'.
Californian federal judge William H Alsup found that at least 30,000 probationary employees working at the Department of Veterans Affairs, Department of Energy, Department of Defense, Department of Agriculture, Department of the Treasury and the Department of the Interior, were wrongfully fired for 'poor performance'.
They were axed as part of the new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), headed up by the world's richest man Elon Musk, alongside entrepreneur and former Republican presidential candidate, Vivek Ramaswamy.
Their mission is to streamline the US government through plans to axe thousands of jobs and drastically reduce the wage bill, and once they have finished their mission, they have vowed to disband the department - setting a completion date of no later than July 4, 2026... Independence Day next year.