White House dismisses democrats blaming Trump for Texas floods
The NWS has faced hundreds of job cuts since Trump took office, though it had begun re-hiring in June. White House Deputy Press Secretary Abigail Jackson (pictured) fired back at critics in a tweet thread on Sunday afternoon. 'I have seen many uninformed Democrats shamefully spreading Fake News about Texas, so let's get the facts straight,' she wrote. Jackson then cited several meteorologists who said protocol was followed and the NWS was both 'on the ball' and 'did their job and did it well.'
The National Weather Service office in New Braunfels, which delivers forecasts for Austin, San Antonio and the surrounding areas, had extra staff on duty during the storms, Jason Runyen, a meteorologist in the National Weather Service office, said. Where the office would typically have two forecasters on duty during clear weather, they had up to five on staff. 'There were extra people in here that night, and that's typical in every weather service office — you staff up for an event and bring people in on overtime and hold people over,' Runyen said. Meanwhile, it appears local officials had no ability to warn the public themselves.
Kerr County Judge Rob Kelly, the county's top elected official, said the county considered a flood warning system along the river that would have functioned like a tornado warning siren about six or seven years ago, before he was elected, but that the idea never got off the ground because of the expense. 'We've looked into it before … The public reeled at the cost,' Kelly said. He said he didn't know what kind of safety and evacuation plans the camps may have had. 'What I do know is the flood hit the camp first, and it came in the middle of the night. I don't know where the kids were,' he said. 'I don't know what kind of alarm systems they had. That will come out in time.' Finger pointing has landed on the National Weather Service which had recently begun the process of hiring 100 new employees.
However, this came months after around 600 people were fired from the agency in recent months as part of massive cuts to the federal government under Trump, according to NPR . By April, nearly half of NWS forecast offices had 20 percent vacancy rates. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem was brutally grilled over the delayed warning alerts Texas residents received before the monster flash flood was about to devastate the state . Noem joined Governor Greg Abbott and other state personnel for a press conference on Saturday, where a journalist grilled the cabinet member on the delayed warning from the National Weather Service. She blamed the 'ancient system' and said the Trump Administration would look into renewing the system to better work for US citizens. 'The weather is extremely difficult to predict,' Noem said. 'But also that the National Weather Service, over the years at times, has done well and at times, we have all wanted more time and more warning and more notification.'
She said the Trump administration would make it a priority to upgrade National Weather Service technology used to deliver warnings. 'We know that everyone wants more warning time, and that's why we're working to upgrade the technology that's been neglected for far too long to make sure families have as much advance notice as possible,' Noem said during a press conference with state and federal leaders. Noem did not bring up how the Trump Administration had proposed cuts for FEMA and NOAA, both of which help during natural disasters. The proposal includes cutting NOAA's weather laboratories that research severe storms, as well as, its hub for climate science coordination and research.
The cuts led a Florida meteorologist to sound the alarm on what a decimated NWS would do just a month ago. Flood-ravaged parts of Texas are set to be pounded by an additional 'wall of water' officials have warned, as they announced a new wave of evacuations. Nim Kidd, Chief of the Texas Division of Emergency Management, advised Kerr County to brace for more of the deadly rains which have already claimed the lives of at least 80 people. 'There are unconfirmed at this point reports of additional water coming in. And as the governor mentioned, there's rain still falling on the area,' Kidd said at a press conference. 'We've got DPS aircraft that are flying up to try to find this wall of water right now, and the people in the reported areas, again, unconfirmed, that are on our communication systems.'
Locals in central Texas are being urged to scramble to higher ground following further flash flood warnings as a result of further rain falling on saturated ground. Among the deceased so far are at least five young girls, aged between eight and nine, whose summer camp in Hunt, Texas was swept away by the floods in the early hours of July 4. Rescue workers said at least 11 other campers are still missing.
So far 40 adults and 28 children have died in total, after the Guadalupe River rose more than 26 feet in just 45 minutes, pounding Kerr County communities with flash flooding. It comes after the Trump administration made major cuts to federal funding, impacting agencies like FEMA which lead the response to natural disasters.
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