DOGE-led cuts at NOAA include layoffs of Miami-based hurricane and climate researchers
Hurricane and climate researchers in Miami were hit in the latest wave of cuts from Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency.
The mass layoffs from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration — more than 600, according to the former agency head — include at least one high-profile meteorologist in Miami and another charged with integrating artificial intelligence into climate and weather predictions.
“Every office in NOAA was hit by these indiscriminate, misguided, ill-intentioned reforms,” said Rick Spinrad, former director of NOAA under President Joe Biden, in a press conference Friday afternoon.
Spinrad said the cuts, especially of researchers who collect data that feeds into storm models, could erode the quality of hurricane forecasts going forward.
“It’s not clear the planes will be able to fly and the ships will be able to go to sea, certainly not at the tempo we saw before,” he said. “The quality of the forecast is likely to go down to some degree.”
On Thursday afternoon, some NOAA staffers began posting on social media that they got “the email” and lost their jobs as part of President Donald Trump’s bid to slash staffing in the federal government. Andrew Hazelton, an assistant scientist with the Miami-based Hurricane Research Division, was among them.
“I don’t want to make any comments other than I am exploring legal options in a couple of avenues,” he posted on X.
Another weather researcher, Zach Lane, also posted on X that he lost his job helping NOAA perfect the use of AI and machine learning in climate and weather predictions.
“After nearly two weeks of overwhelming uncertainty, today it happened. I was fired from my dream of working at NOAA. I’m so sorry to everyone also affected,” he posted.
Two sources who were familiar with the matter confirmed another researcher in the Keys National Marine Sanctuary is also leaving, after the longtime scientist took the buyout offered by Musk’s DOGE agency earlier this month.
The true scope of the cuts was unclear Friday afternoon. All requests for comment to NOAA, the National Hurricane Center and the Hurricane Research Division were unanswered. Instead, officials provided a statement saying the agency does not comment on internal personnel matters.
“NOAA remains dedicated to its mission, providing timely information, research, and resources that serve the American public and ensure our nation’s environmental and economic resilience. We continue to provide weather information, forecasts and warnings pursuant to our public safety mission,” the statement read.
‘Uncontrolled free fall’
During the Friday press conference, Democratic lawmakers stressed that these cuts were “a pillar of Project 2025,” a conservative road map to a smaller government that was widely publicized and circulated ahead of Trump’s most recent election. In it, the drafters of the plan outlined a strategy to privatize NOAA and its weather data.
“The National Weather Service is a public good. We all benefit from that information. They want to turn it over to someone who will make a big profit off it, who will charge Americans for the products they get now as part of the common good,” said Sen. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland.
Mark Eakin, a recently retired NOAA veteran who ran its Coral Reef Watch program for many years, told the Miami Herald he was alarmed by the “indiscriminate” slashes throughout the agency, which oversees everything from cutting-edge climate research to day-to-day operations that farmers and fishers rely on, as well as life-saving weather warnings.
“We’re going to see people die as a result of this totally uncontrolled free fall they’re putting agencies into,” he said.
Eakin said current employees are scared their jobs could be next, no matter how glowing their recent performance reviews or how crucial their duties are. He also worries that important information on the effects of climate change could be lost at the whim of new political operatives overseeing the agency.
“In the first Trump administration, we made backup plans for various data sets stored elsewhere — just in case. I hope that that’s being done now because key data could be lost,” he said.
This story was originally published February 28, 2025 at 3:47 PM.
