US Defense Department will stop providing satellite weather data

[accurrent]

As a non-American who's life has been previously saved by knowing that a typhoon would strike my home this has me wondering how we will be affected. A lot of smaller countries don't have the infrastructure/man power to maintain a space program. To what extent is the rest of the world reliant on this data and what does this mean for us? Will we still have predictions? How does international collaboration on meteorology generally work? Do Europeans/Chinese/Indians/Russians also share data about weather?

[ars]

Such hyperbolic comments!

The DMSP program was discontinued in 2015 by a vote in congress[1]. Virtually every working stallelite in this program has failed. As best as I can tell there's just a single working one specifically NOAA-19[2].

Instead the program has switched to JPSS[3] which is part of GEOSS[4].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_Meteorological_Satelli... (scroll up slightly)

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NOAA-19

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Polar_Satellite_System

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Earth_Observation_Syste...

[Buttons840]

I see 3 possibilities: They're cutting it off to limit bad news about climate change, for political reasons. Or they're trying to set up some private company to sell the same data.

Or (tinfoil hat on) they're going to do something the raw microwave data might expose and so they're trying to keep the microwave data secret.

[CharlesW]

There's no mystery, this is the execution of Project 2025. https://envirodatagov.org/project-2025-annotation/

[ars]

There's a 4th possibility: This program was cancelled in 2015 and it finally ended.

The replacement is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Polar_Satellite_System

[rooftopzen]

Also historically happens during wartimes: https://niemanreports.org/press-access-to-satellite-images-i...

[WarOnPrivacy]

Here is what will be denied to NOAA, now and going forward

    Defense Department data also allow hurricane forecasters to see
    hurricanes as they form, and monitor them in real-time.

    For example, hurricane experts can see where the center of a 
    newly formed storm is, which allows them to figure out as 
    early as possible what direction it is likely to go, and whether
    the storm might hit land. That's important for people in harm's way,
    who need as much time as possible to decide whether to evacuate,
    and to prepare their homes for wind and water.

The public paid for this data. Deliberately siloing the data to insure it can't save American lives wouldn't just be theft, it would be an act indistinguishable from evil.

[whycombagator]

> NOAA, which oversees the National Hurricane Center, says the loss of the Defense Department data will not lead to less-accurate hurricane forecasts this year. In a statement, NOAA communications director Kim Doster said, "NOAA's data sources are fully capable of providing a complete suite of cutting-edge data and models that ensure the gold-standard weather forecasting the American people deserve."

[whoopdedo]

>The public paid for this data.

Someone should file weekly FOIA requests.

[aprilthird2021]

Wow, they'll literally kill American citizens and American citizens will still overwhelmingly vote for them...

[renegade-otter]

Generally the outcome of voting for criminals, thieves, and conmen/women.

And then people wonder why they are erecting spikes around the White House and the Treasury. The pillaging has begun.

[mistrial9]

> it would be ...

lots of ways to fill in that part. iterating the words seems worth the effort. Thinking out loud, there are readers with frame of reference, and movements or politics-in-practice that have frames of reference, in the messaging .. So making a 2x2 square and filling it in.. you can write for the readers and refine, you can align with movements or their spokespersons and refine, all combined with you yourself representing what you are about.

So to complete the exercise.. how many readers of YNews would respond to "that is evil" wording.. how many movements or politics-in-practice would say "that is evil" as part of their outfacing communications.. and how strongly to you, the writer, want to associate the concepts of "that is evil" with respect to other things that you say or think are important.

I write this pedantic screed because this is so, so critical to communicate right now. The narrow rocky valley pass in which to lay an ambush, is completely in place.. the budget strings. Everyone knows that this is raw executive power in action.. it is to be, because I say so, implemented via the purse. I am not sure how much to include those backdrop statements in any impactful messaging though, because "there is no bad news in sales" and popularity or adaption is part of the task.

[idiotsecant]

This is example number 7748492 of how the decline of America will be practically irreversible once a political machine with any kind of rational worldview is in charge again. It took a century to build some of the things that are being destroyed in days or weeks. We're looking at the fall of rome. The only question now is whether a dark age follows or whether someone else takes over.

[righthand]

This is part of Project 2025 to destroy the NOAA. [0]

> Break up the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

> "fully commercialize" the National Weather Service's forecasting operations.[1]

[0] https://www.project2025.observer/?search=NOAA

[1] https://www.project2025.observer/?search=Weather

[mtmail]

One of arguments seems to be based on climate change denial

"Together, these [six main offices of NOAS] form a colossal operation that has become one of the main drivers of the climate change alarm industry and, as such, is harmful to future U.S. prosperity. This industry’s mission emphasis on prediction and management seems designed around the fatal conceit of planning for the unplannable"

"Scientific agencies like NOAA are vulnerable to obstructionism of an Administration’s aims if political appointees are not wholly in sync with Administration policy. Particular attention must be paid to appointments in this area."

[conradev]

A lot of very specific things in the original source: https://static.heritage.org/project2025/2025_MandateForLeade...

I found this one funny:

  Overlap exists between the National Marine Fisheries Service and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Overly simplified, the NMFS handles saltwater species while the Fish and Wildlife Service focuses on fresh water. The goals of these two agencies should be streamlined.

Right next to

  Scientific agencies like NOAA are vulnerable to obstructionism of an Administration’s aims if political appointees are not wholly in sync with Administration policy. Particular attention must be paid to appointments in this area.

Yikes.

[ivape]

What in the actual fuck. I can’t believe they are actually doing all those little petty things.

[Mobius01]

Is this an attempt at controlling the narrative around climate change, in line with the impacts at NOAA and other climate-related government agencies?

[mason_mpls]

Don’t look up!

[gwerbin]

Yes. Quoting Projct 225:

> Break Up NOAA ... NOAA consists of six main offices ... Together, these form a colossal operation that has become one of the main drivers of the climate change alarm industry and, as such, is harmful to future U.S. prosperity. This industry’s mission emphasis on prediction and management seems designed around the fatal conceit of planning for the unplannable. That is not to say NOAA is useless, but its current organization corrupts its useful functions. It should be broken up and downsized. NOAA today boasts that it is a provider of environmental information services, a provider of environmental stewardship services, and a leader in applied scientific research. Each of these functions could be provided commercially, likely at lower cost and higher quality.

https://envirodatagov.org/project-2025-national-oceanic-and-...

Tldr: shut down NOAA to suppress climate change evidence, research, and preparedness; outsource to private industry the remaining parts that are considered directly useful for commerce.

Is it any wonder that the CEO of Accuweather Barry Myers was a Trump donor who became a NOAA head administrator appointee in Trump's first term? The appointment fortunately failed. Now they're trying again.

[ars]

No, this was cancelled by congress in 2015 and switched to the JPSS program which is running and active.

[leereeves]

> "There are cybersecurity concerns. That's what we're being told."

Anyone know what that's about?

[WarOnPrivacy]

> "There are cybersecurity concerns. That's what we're being told."

Let's try to make sense of that.

    1) the cybersecurity talent from DoD and USG is so decimated it can't
    field a response to whatever this concern is or

    2) the DoD has the talent to resolve whatever this concern is and they
    are deliberately leaving this concern in place or

    3) the DoD is lying about a cybersecurity issue being the reason
    that they're withholding lifesaving data (from benefiting
    the public that paid for it).

[sunflowerfly]

They want to privatize it for private gain and to shut down climate change alarms. It is in Project 2025.

[bigiain]

Blamestorming, fingerpointing, and avoiding saying anything that might make Trump tweet about them in allcaps at 2am.

[aswanson]

Good God. The Fall of civilizations episode for the United States will be galactically stupid. The Sumerians: climate change and soil degradation. The Assyrians: external tribes organizing against their brutality. The US: fox news, AM radio, and conspiracy theory uncle Facebook memes.

[actionfromafar]

Strikingly succinct.

[bamboozled]

Podcasts.

[ChrisArchitect]

Earlier:

Hurricane Forecasters Lose Crucial Satellite Data, with Serious Implications

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44402665

[mlfreeman]

Are the satellites being turned off, or could people with SDRs pick this up directly from space and offer it up for free?

[Buttons840]

They're DoD satellites, so encryption is a real possibility.

[ethan_smith]

Yes, many weather satellites broadcast in frequencies accessible to amateur SDR setups (137-138MHz for NOAA polar orbiting satellites), though military weather satellites like DMSP use different frequencies and encryption that make civilian reception significantly more challenging.

[maxglute]

What unique weather monitoring does DoD have over civilian capabilities or other govs who has weather satellites?

[DonnyV]

No one agrees to this so why are we accepting this??

[galacticaactual]

Because if you want the data go get it yourself.

[stego-tech]

“We shouldn’t keep trusting nation-states for meteorology data. They can and will cut off access if the powers that be demand it, even if it hurts billions of others by doing so.” - Me, circa mid-2010s

“You’re overreacting, nobody would be dumb enough to cut off access to data like that. Stop being alarmist.” - Everyone I have shared that thought with since.

Unfortunately, “I Told You So’s” don’t pay my rent, otherwise I’d have a decent home of my own by now. Here’s hoping ESA or JAXA help fill that gap until the UN can take over (an organization ideally suited for global meteorology tasks).

[sorcerer-mar]

People probably reacted poorly to this because it's hard to disambiguate from "we shouldn't keep trusting nation-states for x [because I'm actively working to profit from providing an alternative]" from "[because I'm worried others will dismantle it despite my best efforts to prevent it]"

[alexpotato]

Michael Lewis, in the Fifth Risk, has a whole chapter on how during Trump 1 the head of Accuweather was basically trying to shut down free distribution of weather updates from NOAA/National Weather Service.

The reason:

For profit weather companies don't want free government weather updates going out to their potential customers.

PS. Having been on HN for many years and watched the full "disrupt old industries!" cycle, I'm not that surprised this is where we have ended up.

[beefnugs]

Its like dump said, they will start nuking the typhoons or whatever that shape is on the radar. Aint nobody got time for analysis

[mason_mpls]

so now we get to pay for our weather forecasts twice, once for the military and once for us

[burnt-resistor]

The billionaire's mantra: "Anything free is communism! Gubberment bad!"

This is a sign of a larger effort to replay the fall of the Soviet Union in America: sell off public lands, privatize everything that was public, and charge more money and take on debt for worse services where funds are gifted as dividends to owners rather than providing value to customers because a powerful ruling class demands more money and more power.

[pasquinelli]

> "It's not an issue of funding cuts," says Mark Serreze, the director of the National Snow and Ice Data Center, a federally funded research center in Colorado that has relied on the soon-to-be-terminated Defense Department data **to track sea ice since 1979**. "There are cybersecurity concerns. That's what we're being told."

hmmmmmmmmmm

[jimnotgym]

The rest of the world needs to club closer together, and quickly. The US is no longer a reliable ally.

[jzb]

It’s no longer a reliable place to live, either.

[GiorgioG]

By all means please do and pay for it yourselves.

[mtmail]

Russia, China, Europe have similar systems https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satellite_navigation#Global_na... It'd be a huge disruption but it's not irreplaceable.

[chamomeal]

Is that possible? I thought GPS works by just listening for signals from GPS satellites?

I’m now realizing I know hardly anything about GPS. Like it was made in the 50’s or something? Do we keep sending more GPS satellites into space? Or are there just the original handful?

[XorNot]

Which would be hilarious because one of the primary reasons GPS became generally accessible was because consumer GPS being accurate made it easier and cheaper to stick GPS in absolutely everything the military uses.

Basically trying to deny accurate positioning tends to not help your own forces as much as it being trivial for them to call back to your giant logistics machine with accurate positioning.

[dzhiurgis]

It’s already been discontinued by jamming in many places.

Ironically best fit for replacement is Starlink constellation.

IMHO after seeing what Ukraine pulled off in Russia recently - un-jammable gnss is kinda dangerous until drones like Skydio trickle down to the masses.

[ars]

It has nothing to do with 2025, this program was cancelled in 2015.

[fnordpiglet]

Vote.

[rhyperior]

Even though a majority voted for him, tens of millions did not.

[1over137]

>It certainly can’t be as silly as to throw red meat to a base that hates climate data.

Why not? ;(

[fragmede]

John Oliver had a whole episode about this

https://youtu.be/qMGn9T37eR8

tl;dw: AccuWeather, whos CEO donated to Trump's campaign.

[skiboyec]

My hunch is that the location of the satellites can be deduced from the weather data. These satellites would be a target in a time of war.

[gpm]

The location of the satellites is public knowledge. Satellites are trivially tracked from the ground - the amateur community does this whenever someone tries to keep the location of one secret: https://www.popsci.com/zuma-spy-satellite-amateur-astronomer...

They also don't exactly move much, it takes precious fuel to change a satellites orbit.

[3-5105]

Satellites using sun-synchronous orbits can circle the Earth multiple times in a day.Compared with a stationary observer on the ground,they are moving at a relatively fast speed.Therefore,as long as they delay the release of observational data by a random time period,there won't be this issue.Only geostationary satellites would have this problem.

But a bigger problem comes before the above issue:most of the current human meteorological satellites do not have stealth capabilities.You can see them directly.Perhaps your idea will become a practical problem when satellite stealth technology matures.

This is a translation.

[dmix]

Most plausible reason. National security hawks have always been extremely protective of intelligence even when the risk is tiny. Probably some DoD people (or person) wanted to keep it closed and new hawkish leadership let them do it.

Who knows, the Navy hasn't released any statement beyond "cyber security risks" so there's only politics to fill in the blanks.

It seems to be this agency https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fleet_Numerical_Meteorology_an...

Who recently got a supercomputer system https://www.montereycountynow.com/news/local_news/a-new-supe...

[skiboyec]

Hmm I think I’m wrong. From what I can tell satellites , especially those in LEO can be optically tracked pretty easily