Sequester could ultimately affect severe-weather forecasting

The nation’s weather service and emergency response agencies won’t feel the immediate sting of the automatic spending cuts that hit the federal government last week, but officials have said it’s just a matter of time.

The National Weather Service will still be able to forecast severe weather events such as the late-winter storm set to hit the Mid-Atlantic region Wednesday, but there’s a chance those forecasts may not be as accurate.

The Commerce Department, which oversees the National Weather Service and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, has said that the reductions will negatively affect weather forecasting.

Acting Commerce Secretary Rebecca M. Blank said in a Feb. 8 report to Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Barbara A. Mikulski (D-Md.) that the required cuts could delay the launch of new weather satellites in coming years, which would “increase the risk of a gap in satellite coverage and diminish the quality of weather forecasts and warnings.”

full: http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/federal_government/sequester-could-ultimately-affect-severe-weather-forecasting/2013/03/05/b41555ee-850b-11e2-9d71-f0feafdd1394_story.html