Avery Kaplan contributed to this report
The United States is confronting a “Triple Danger Season” this year, with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), a key defense against increasingly extreme weather due to climate change, at risk. The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) is monitoring the Trump administration’s ongoing actions against this vital agency, highlighting changes from past to proposed NOAA budgets, reductions in datasets, tools, and services, and the effects of staffing shortages. The UCS’s NOAA tracker reveals what’s at stake and what has been taken from taxpayers.
Danger Season, identified by UCS as the period between May and October when the U.S. faces numerous extreme weather and climate-related challenges, is particularly severe this year. This is due to the convergence of climate change, governmental instability, and economic insecurity. Already, the nation has experienced dramatic weather extremes, such as a record-breaking March heatwave in the West that worsened drought conditions and hastened wildfire season, and a heatwave in the East that made April feel like July, coupled with widespread drought.
NOAA provides crucial scientific data, research, and forecasts that help prepare for all types of weather, including extreme events. One would expect robust support for NOAA’s operations given the current and anticipated challenges, yet the agency remains under threat from the Trump administration, similar to last year.
In the past year, the administration has persistently targeted NOAA’s staffing, budgets, and scientific resources. The President’s fiscal 2027 budget proposal, backed by NOAA Administrator Neil Jacobs, continues this trend. Furthermore, the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is withholding congressionally approved funds, implementing a trickle-down disbursement strategy that hampers NOAA’s essential and life-saving work, making it much harder to accomplish.
Let’s delve into NOAA’s critical role during Danger Season, the impact of the administration’s actions on the agency, and UCS’s efforts to monitor and counter these attacks.
What NOAA does during Danger Season
NOAA is essential year-round, but especially during Danger Season, as it forecasts weather events and enhances our understanding of weather, climate, freshwater, and oceans through research and observation. The agency develops tools and operations to better prepare for extreme events.
These operations are crucial for the national economy, generating $30 billion a year in economic benefits from public weather forecasts and information alone.
NOAA’s efficiency stems from its integrated structure, where its six line offices work together, combining observations, forecasts, research, and operations to deliver life-saving results.
Consider a hurricane scenario: The National Weather Service (NWS) uses data from the National Environmental Satellite Data and Information Service (NESDIS), the National Ocean Service (NOS), and the Office of Marine and Aviation Operations (OMAO) to provide forecasts and warnings.
Research on hurricanes from NOAA’s Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research (OAR) aids the NWS in developing new forecasting tools. This integrated approach has improved evacuations and emergency planning, saving nearly $5 billion per major hurricane making landfall in the U.S.
During Danger Season, NOAA’s integrated system is critical for translating data into forecasts, warnings, and guidance for communities, which is increasingly necessary as extreme events become more frequent and severe in a warming climate.
And yet the administration is undermining NOAA AGAIN
Despite the nation’s reliance on NOAA, the Trump administration’s policy and budget decisions are weakening the agency. Supported by NOAA Administrator Neil Jacobs, the administration has proposed slashing NOAA funding by 32% ($1.6 billion) for the next fiscal year, including the termination of the OAR and several grant programs.
Even after Congress rejected the budget cuts for this fiscal year, OMB director Russ Vought is executing the administration’s plans by employing trickle-down disbursement tactics across multiple agencies, including the National Science Foundation. For NOAA, this involves delaying grants crucial for its activities, such as those supporting its Cooperative Institutes.
Recently, half of the staff at NOAA’s Global Monitoring Lab (GML), which maintains long-term measurements of greenhouse gases like CO2, faced layoffs by May 15 because the OMB allowed their funding grant to lapse on March 24.
This grant supports NOAA’s Cooperative Institute for Research and Environmental Sciences (CIRES), where scientists operate tools for GML’s measurements, including aerosol networks and CO2 monitoring. The OMB approved the funds a month after the lapse.
Despite Congress allocating funds for NOAA CIRES and GML months ago, the OMB is stalling or slowly disbursing them, putting critical information at risk. This delay is one of several attacks on NOAA by the administration.
Last year, NOAA experienced severe staffing shortages, funding cut threats, abrupt dataset terminations, and proposed shutdowns of valuable products, like key satellites for hurricane forecasting during the Atlantic Hurricane Season. NOAA’s Global Historical Climatological Network still faces major disruptions, with only 6,000 of its 20,000 stations reporting weather and climate data. This occurred amid extreme weather throughout Danger Season 2025.
Each loss affects NOAA’s entire system. The administration is reorganizing the NWS, which is still recovering from past staffing shortages. The NWS Director reported that staff are “burning out.” These challenges raise concerns for the upcoming Danger Season. Will NOAA face more funding lapses, abrupt dataset cancellations, and long-term impacts on its ability to forecast and research extreme events, endangering both people and the economy?
What UCS is doing: NOAA Tracker
Amid growing threats to NOAA, UCS strives to inform the public, policymakers, and stakeholders about what is at risk. UCS has created a NOAA tracker, a centralized resource documenting changes to NOAA’s programs, funding, and datasets.
Here, you can find details on previous and proposed NOAA budgets by line office, cuts to datasets, tools, and services, and ongoing impacts from staffing shortages. A “Readme” provides additional information.
The NOAA Tracker is publicly accessible here. It is recommended that everyone, especially Congress members, review it to understand NOAA’s activities and the impacts of the Trump administration’s proposals, including closures and funding cuts. Transparency is crucial to understand the administration’s plans affecting NOAA and the public.
NOAA is vital to communities, businesses, farmers, and emergency management officials, among others. Congress must protect this essential scientific resource, ensuring it is well-funded, well-staffed, safeguarded against dismantling, and its scientific integrity is upheld.
Check out the latest on Danger Season and NOAA blogs for more insights.
The nation’s capacity to handle extreme weather, particularly in the upcoming Danger Season, relies significantly on NOAA’s strength and the scientific infrastructure it supports. Weakening this system now would result in less preparation time, less forecast certainty, and more damage when disasters occur.
