Disasters

"Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem has doubled down on her past calls to eliminate the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) — but also says it should be “remade” as the agency responds to floods in Texas."

"The National Severe Storms Laboratory sits on a campus of radar equipment and office buildings at the University of Oklahoma, off a state highway in Norman. It’s responsible for radar breakthroughs in forecasting that the nation relies on for storm warnings and emergency preparedness. But the Trump administration wants to shut it down, prompting a rare rebuke from a prominent Republican member of Congress."

"Human-caused climate change is responsible for killing about 1,500 people in last week’s European heat wave, a first-of-its-kind rapid study found."

"The Department of Energy report is widely viewed as groundwork for the White House to order coal and gas plants slated for closure to run for longer." 

"President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration told a panel of U.S. senators on Wednesday that he would make it “a top priority” to fill staffing shortages created by recent firings and buyouts across the National Weather Service, while also standing by the administration’s proposal to make drastic cuts to weather and climate research budgets."

"Days after an intense, record-breaking heat wave sweltered wide swaths of Europe, a group of scientists released a rapid analysis estimating the extent to which climate change might have amplified the heat wave’s death toll."

"Early Sunday morning, Tropical Storm Chantal had blown ashore in South Carolina, and by the time it meandered into central North Carolina, it had weakened to a tropical depression. But by nightfall the impacts felt akin to a hurricane: 5 to 10 inches of rain fell within 12 hours. Dams burst. Interstates closed. Roads washed away. The Haw River reached historic levels, rising as much as 22 feet in four hours, engulfing parts of Saxapahaw."

"The Trump administration says it will uphold a Biden-era ban on the ongoing use of asbestos after previously saying it would reconsider the rule."

"The National Weather Service issued timely alerts, meteorologists say, but few were listening in the hours before the early morning flash floods."  "The catastrophic floods that struck central Texas on Friday show that accurate weather forecasts alone aren’t enough to save lives."

"The White House is planning to eliminate the board, a small agency that investigates chemical disasters to understand what went wrong."