Shitstain Fires Chief NASA Scientist; Meanwhile, Rare Cyclone In S. Queensland Drives Fresh Climate Denial

It’s not a good time for climate science. The Trump administration has sacked more than a thousand staff from the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the country’s leading agency for weather forecasting and climate science, potentially damaging its ability to do lifesaving work forecasting hurricanes and other extreme weather events. The New York Times reported plans are under way to fire another 1,000. If true, that will take the cuts to about 20% of the workforce.

On Monday, it was announced Nasa was axing its chief scientist, Katherine Calvin, who had been appointed to lead the agency’s work on climate change. In trademark Donald Trump/Elon Musk style, there appears little care or sense in where cuts have been made. It’s destruction for destruction’s sake, with tens of thousands of peer-reviewed scientific papers underpinning the understanding of climate science dismissed as a “hoax” or, somehow, “woke”. As in most areas, what happens in the US on forecasting and science capability will have an impact beyond its borders.

In Australia, the past week has seen a fresh wave of climate denial as ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred approached and hit the southern Queensland coast. News Corp outlets, in particular, have run straw man arguments attacking people that have forcefully linked the storm to the climate crisis. Some commentators have pointed out that southern Queensland has had cyclones before. Others have suggested there is uncertainty in the data about the pace and way in which they are changing, and that climate change didn’t “cause” Alfred. Well, yes. That’s all correct, of course, but hardly the point.

What they mostly haven’t said is that the ocean and atmosphere are demonstrably warmer than even just a few years ago. Or that this means the most intense storms formed in warmer conditions carry more energy and more water. Or that the conditions under which tropical cyclones can form are moving south as the planet heats up. Tropical cyclones can take shape when the sea is 26.5C. Temperatures at that level are not enough for a cyclone to form – a range of climatic conditions have to occur – but they are being reached and sustained more often in places further away from the equator.

EDIT

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/commentisfree/2025/mar/11/ex-tropical-cyclone-alfred-climate-denial-australia-trump-attacks-us-science-agencies