NOAA nominee questioned on weather warnings after deadly Texas floods

WASHINGTON - Neil Jacobs, President Donald Trump's pick to lead the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, faced a Senate committee confirmation hearing on Wednesday.

Jacobs' committee confirmation comes days after flash flooding in Central Texas killed more than 100 people.

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, who leads the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, opened the hearing with remarks on the tragedy in Texas, specifically the flooding at Camp Mystic, an all-girls' Christian camp in Hunt, Texas. The camp says 27 campers and counselors died.

What they're saying:

"I'm the father of two daughters," Cruz said. "When I think of those little girls that were lost at Camp Mystic, it's every parent's worst nightmare."

Cruz toured the camp with other Texas leaders on Monday.

"The devastation in that 100-year-old beautiful girls' camp that has helped raise generations of girls and women in Texas. The devastation was the most horrific thing I've ever seen."

Cruz also recalled meeting Coast Guard Petty Officer Scott Ruskan, who is credited with saving more than 150 people in his first rescue mission.

"When I saw him, he had just hung up from talking with a mom and dad and with their daughter and they said,'You saved our daughter's life and when she was there, terrified out of her mind, you held her hand and told her it would be okay,'" Cruz said.

Neil Jacobs questioned about weather warnings

What they're saying:

"If confirmed, what will you do to better ensure that Americans are aware of and able to respond to emergency weather warnings, especially those that arrive in the middle of the night?" Cruz said.

Jacobs said he would like to advance numerical weather prediction, the most common form of weather prediction where current weather observations are used to forecast future weather. Jacobs said another improvement he would like to see is the modernization of the NOAA weather radio.

"Getting the warnings to the people, particularly at late hours of the night, is a challenge," Jacobs said. "I think we can do, more advancements moving away from copper wire, moving towards telecom, potentially satellite to send out these messages."

Jacobs also said he wanted more data for extreme weather events, similar to the way the National Transportation Safety Board collects data after a plane crash. 

"Because we need the data to understand what went right, what went wrong, whether people got the warnings, if they did or didn't, and if they did, did they not understand them?" Jacobs said.

As head of NOAA, Jacobs would also be in charge of the National Weather Service, an agency that's come under fire recently after reports show that 55 of 122 National Weather Services field offices have vacancy rates of over 20 percent.

Changes to how forecasts are created

One change Jacobs suggested during Wednesday's hearing was moving forcasting and modeling software to a cloud-based system to allow forecasters access to data wherever they are, allowing them to go to major weather events.

"They could literally work from anywhere," Jacobs said. "And so embedding in the emergency management centers, particularly during major weather events, would be really advantageous."

Speculation on social media questioned if a lack of alerts happened because of understaffing in the National Weather Service, and if federal cuts have left vacancies at the agency.  

The other side:

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, told The Associated Press. 

Where the office would typically have two forecasters on duty during clear weather, they had up to five on staff.

TexasWeatherNews