NOAA is sending four wind-powered, unmanned Saildrones toward the equator to study a potentially record-breaking El Niño. The agency has no specific research missions planned, though, and says its effort won’t match the planes, ships and aircraft deployed in 2016. The event is nearing its winter peak in November and December, as communities face risks from destructive storms, floods and droughts.
A narrower federal response
For four months, the Saildrones will collect ocean temperatures and other data. Other research projects depend on Congress passing a budget, while the government operates under a continuing resolution through Dec. 11. NOAA’s Office of Marine and Aviation Operations says it has no specific El Niño research missions currently planned.
NOAA hopes to spend $2 million to $5 million on research to improve observation and prediction, according to Annarita Mariotti of NOAA’s Climate Program Office. The agency’s smaller effort now contrasts with the rapid-response campaign it mounted during the 2015-16 El Niño, when researchers used weather balloons, a research ship, a research plane and NASA’s Global Hawk to collect observations across the Pacific.
Ten weather and climate researchers who spoke with NPR called the current event an important case study. El Niño occurs when a large area of the eastern Pacific warms around the equator, releasing heat that affects the atmosphere and shifts weather patterns. Rainfall typically grows more intense in the southern United States, while the northern half of the country becomes drier and warmer.
El Niño can bring destructive rainstorms and floods to some regions, and severe droughts to others. Better, earlier forecasts can help communities prepare and respond, and may save lives. Researchers also want to understand how the pattern forms and whether climate change and emissions from burning fossil fuels are making such events more intense.
Budget and agency capacity
NOAA’s research capacity is under strain. Since Trump began his second term, the agency has lost more than 2,000 staff, largely through retirements and firings; data from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management show a roughly 20% staff loss.
For the second year in a row, the Trump administration is seeking to eliminate NOAA’s Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research, which studies climate patterns such as El Niño. Its budget proposal “eliminates all funding for climate, weather, and ocean laboratories and cooperative institutes” in order to focus “on NOAA’s public safety mission,” and would transfer some research to the National Weather Service.
Congress’ budget deal preserved the office last year while transferring some of its budget to the National Weather Service. The administration is also seeking cuts to climate research across NOAA, including programs it described as “spread baseless environmental alarm.” Earlier this year, the administration announced it would begin removing the Ocean Observatories Initiative, which provides sea-temperature data important during El Niño. The scientific community pushed back, and the administration reversed the decision this summer.
What the previous campaign found
During the 2015-16 event, NOAA released weather balloons twice a day on the Pacific island of Kiritimati, near the equator. A NOAA research ship launched balloons eight times per day during a month-long cruise, and a NOAA research plane made 22 flights across the Pacific, dropping instruments into storms. Researchers also used NASA’s Global Hawk, an unmanned long-range aircraft, to gather data that went to weather-forecast models in real time.
The campaign showed how observations can inform forecasts, though its predictions didn’t match every outcome. California prepared for damaging rain and flooding that never materialized; precipitation was below average there for most of the winter. South Carolina experienced catastrophic flooding.
“You can do research after events are over for years or decades, but you have to get the observations during the event,” said Randy Dole, who helped lead the campaign at NOAA’s Physical Sciences Laboratory and retired in 2016. “That was a critical consideration, and so we were going to do whatever we could, to the best of our ability, to get data that could be used both at that current time and in the future.”
Aircraft observations of atmospheric rivers—storms that bring heavy rain and have caused some of California’s most destructive floods—can add detail to satellite data. Researchers at UC San Diego found that readings from planes flying in and near storms improve forecasts of where storms will hit the West Coast and how heavy the rain will be. Marty Ralph, director of the Center for Western Weather and Water Extremes at UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography, said his project’s partnership with NOAA to collect data using its “hurricane hunter” aircraft is expected to continue this winter. “That is a solid request that’s been made, and it’s being considered, and it’s in a very tight budget environment,” he said.