OKC Standard

Washington, D.C. - Congresswoman Bice (R-OK) and seven of her colleagues have addressed a letter to Director Kenneth Graham of the National Weather Service (NWS), expressing concerns about reported outages affecting radar data, the Automated Surface Observing System, and NOAA Weather Radio transmitters.

"On multiple occurrences this year, some of NWS life-saving services, including radar data, the Automated Surface Observing System, and transmitters of NOAA Weather Radio, have been reported as nonfunctional for extended periods of time," stated the Members. "These outages have impacted NWS Weather Forecast Offices and the public at large, removing critical tools for observation and communicating severe weather."

The letter highlighted several incidents where services were disrupted. These included an outage on April 2, 2024, at the NWS data center in College Park, MD; issues at Weather Forecast Offices in Wakefield, VA and Dover, DE; problems with the Automated Surface Observing System in Rome, GA; and a failure with the NOAA Weather Radio transmitter in Cullman, AL.

To address these concerns and seek solutions for both immediate and long-term resilience against such outages, the Members posed several questions to NWS:

1. What steps is NWS taking to immediately prevent future outages? What steps can only be taken if FY 25 appropriations match the President’s Budget Request?

2. Given current funding levels, what plans or strategies are in place to avoid service failures and improve resiliency?

3. Can NWS provide a breakdown of specific activities within the Integrated Dissemination Program and how each was funded in FY 23 and FY 24?

4. What specific updates has NWS made?

5. Can you describe changes made to the automatic network backup process to ensure system continuity with a backup data center in Boulder, CO?

6. Has NWS identified any upcoming or unpaid expenses related to weather equipment or services due to implementing a new financial system?

7. Does NWS have a contingency plan to avoid a backlog of reimbursement payments if additional services or personnel are required during future disaster responses?

8. Has the current backlog of reimbursement payments affected any contracts with private companies?

The letter was signed by Rep. Lucas (R-OK), Rep. Hern (R-OK), Rep. Brecheen (R-OK), Rep. Fleischmann (R-TN), Rep. Rose (R-TN), Rep. Kean (R-NJ), and Rep. D'Esposito (R-NY).