Ever notice how stupid people always try to pull you down to their level?
“Never argue with stupid people, they will drag you down to their level and then beat you with experience.”
― Mark Twain
One of the most powerful weapons for bludgeoning stupid people who desperately wish to cling to the notion that climate change is all a conspiracy to make them look, well, stupid – is the steady flow of good, well presented and richly visual information from NASA. Polling shows that professional scientists at our government research agencies are consistently rated as the most credible sources of good information on climate science.
Hence the move by Congress to destroy NASA’s Earth Observing capability.
Above: Jane Lubchenco, former NOAA administrator, discusses using satellites to monitor weather patterns. If rushed, go to 2:16 for the punchline.
Dr. Marshall Shepherd for Capitol Weather Gang:
NASA Administrator Charles Bolden, one of the few people that has actually seen our home planet from the vantage point of space, issued a statement noting that proposed cuts, “gut our Earth science program and threatens to set back generations worth of progress in better understanding our changing climate, and our ability to prepare for and respond to earthquakes, droughts, and storm events…” This statement is measured and appropriate, but I am writing to amplify this statement.
Cuts in the $300-500 million dollar range as proposed literally take NASA’s earth science program from the “enhanced” smart phone era back to the first-generation “flip” phones or maybe the rotary phone. It also fundamentally challenges the Congressional mandate of the 1958 Space Act creating NASA. I find the following parts of the Act compelling:
“The aeronautical and space activities of the United States shall be conducted so as to contribute materially to one or more of the following objectives:
The expansion of human knowledge of phenomena in the atmosphere and space … The establishment of long-range studies of the potential benefits to be gained from, the opportunities for, and the problems involved in the utilization of aeronautical and space activities for peaceful and scientific purposes… .The preservation of the role of the United States as a leader in aeronautical and space science and technology and in the application thereof to the conduct of peaceful activities within and outside the atmosphere… The making available to agencies directly concerned with national defenses of discoveries that have military value or significance, and the furnishing by such agencies, to the civilian agency established to direct and control nonmilitary aeronautical and space activities, of information as to discoveries which have value or significance to that agency…”
I am a former scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center and worked on missions to improve our understanding and capabilities in weather prediction, monitoring of hurricanes, and assessment of flood potential. As the former deputy project scientist for the Global Precipitation Measurement mission, I assure you that the level of cuts proposed for NASA’s earth sciences program would not only harm but end many programs and jeopardize many federal and private sector jobs. The engineering, ground systems, science, and support work of NASA earth science missions is supported by some of the most vibrant private aerospace and science-technology companies in the world. And they are U.S. companies.
A few more examples of the value of the NASA earth sciences program are warranted.
I served on a National Academy of Science panel that examined national security implications of climate change on U.S. Naval Operations. This study was commissioned by the Navy itself. We found that Naval Operations depend on accurate knowledge of ocean-atmospheric processes (e.g., ocean currents, changes in sea ice or level, salinity, and so on). Since most of Earth is ocean or inaccessible terrain, satellite platforms are essential for military and civilian operations. This is even more critical as the United States takes over leadership of the Arctic Council.
Does anyone remember the devastation cause by the hybrid hurricane-mid-latitude storm called “Sandy?” Yep, I thought you would. The European and United States weather modeling centers concluded that the 6-9 day forecast accuracy would have suffered without satellite data, some supplied by NASA.
The vast majority of people don’t realize that one of the reasons the European and U.S. weather models have improved is that they integrate atmospheric, land, and ocean conditions. NASA and various U.S. aerospace companies have a close relationship with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) weather satellite program. However, I want to emphasize that the data that goes into the weather models are not just NOAA data. A host of NASA datasets are included too. Harming our weather forecasting ability has direct impact on our economy, agricultural productive, commercial aviation, military operations, and more.
Same medieval tactics as Harper’s War on Science in Canada. Disgusting! If science proves you wrong then you try to eliminate the science. We had that in the middle-ages and before. We don’t need that any more. A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence, not the other way around!
You guys really need to get rid of these medieval fascist taliban and their church of denial. I can’t believe they’re representing the majority of US Americans.
Charles, multiple gerrymander or equivalent processes are at work in US politics. It’s said about US politics that there is ‘no corruption’ as it’s all been made ‘legal’. The amount of money distorting US politics is very large.
To think that a majority is electing the US congress or senate is to be very naive indeed.
Most US people of voting age under 35 are so disengaged from the political process that they just don’t vote.
I think that we are headed into another age of mass dissent as corruption takes over the US government and the young will get to be in open revolt as in the 60s and 70s.
Big coal and oil are in a “fight for their life” and from my past experience would rather take the planet with them than allow democratic processes to cramp their business model.
For an epic helping of GOP stupid, you might (or might not) want to check out Rep. Dana Rohrabacher’s twitter feed.
Rohrabacher has been going after NASA for supposed temperature “data manipulation”. Here are links to twitter conversations where I and others have been trying to set him straight:
https://twitter.com/DanaRohrabacher/status/568218657345683456
https://twitter.com/caerbannog666/status/594904606087319552
Folks, Rohrabacher is the #2 man on the House Science Committee (that NASA must answer to). Now let *that* sink in.
Satellites have also greatly improved the reach of our tornado forecasting and are expected to do even better with the satellites that are supposed to be brought online in the near future.
Case in point: the April 27–30, 2014 tornado outbreak was forecasted as severe weather affecting several states states in advance. Individual tornados have a far smaller lead time, one that is a matter of minutes rather than days, but in either case advanced warning saves lives, whether it means more supplies and personnel are put in place of simply gets more people to shelters.
Also, science is like the eyes of a bug. Each study, scientific instrument, line of evidence or discipline acts like a single lens in a compound eye where the integrated view is far greater than what any one individual lens is capable of on its own. If you start removing them the whole suffers, generally in unexpected and unforeseen ways.
I remembered this little anecdote after posting which seems especially relevant:
In the 60 year history of Space flight there have been 5 fairing failures on launch. The fairing deployment mechanism is not too different from the one that operates the hood of your car (OK, its a bit more robust than that, often employing a small explosive to ensure deployment), and is usually double or triple redundant. Bottom line: they don’t fail.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payload_fairing
But, inexperience can be a problem: the first failure was an early American launch in the 1960s and another failure was S Korea’s first launch ever. One failure was an Earth Observing platform. Failures four and five were BOTH Climate Science satellites and occurred in the 2000s. Keep in mind: you can fail a fairing with a liberal application of duct tape, or Superglue, and the right access just before launch. A skinny technician can do it in 30 minutes. Think of the thousands of launches that have occurred in the last 60 years and how the vast preponderance were military or commercial payloads. Of those dedicated to Science the vast preponderance are looking outward beyond Earths atmosphere. Only a few civil payloads look back toward Earth and the number of missions dedicated to the study of Earth’s climate is minuscule. Put that together with the impossibility of having a fairing failure in the first place and I find a high likelihood that the two Climate missions were sabotaged. Holding back Climate Science (like the studies on the cloud feedback effect and on aerosols) would be hugely important to the World’s largest corporations, right about now: they are selling DOUBT about Climate Science and resolving remaining uncertainties runs against that prerogative. Clearly, they are acting through our bought Congress. I’m just saying: the first fairing failure was followed by an exhaustive multi-million-dollar investigation involving experts on fairing design and deployment that took two years to verify every aspect of the fairings design. The likelihood of it failing AGAIN is just not possible. Personally, I think all three of the Earth Observing failures bear the unmistakable hallmark of sabotage by commercial parties with something to lose by the launch of these satellites.
Now that’s a conspiracy theory I can get behind. I would not put anything beyond what these filthy rotten SOB’s would do to protect their source of riches.
Don’t know how it is in the rest of the country, but we here in the DC area are again being bombarded by TV ads from the oil and gas industry, with emphasis this time on how great fracking is and how the U.S. is soon going to become “energy independent” because of it.
If I read “energy independent” correctly, it means that we will be producing more fossil fuels than we can consume and the FF companies will get rich exporting it to places that will burn it for many years into the future.
I mean, the chance of a launch being A) a climate science mission and B) a fairing failure is astronomically low. If there have been 6,600 satellites launched into space and assuming (generously) 100 were Climate-Science directed, then the odds are 0.0017. The odds of having a fairing failure are 5/6600 = .000758. So the odds of having a climate mission end in fairing failure are about a million to one. The odds of having TWO climate missions end in fairing failure are a trillion to one. Given the multi-trillion-dollar interest in making Climate Science look ‘unfinished’, and the relative ease for someone with access and knowledge to fail a fairing: I’m calling foul. If this is what happened, the cost to the US taxpayers was about a billion dollars. (I’ve worked 20 years in the satellite industry).
It was obvious at first glance that the odds were very long, but doing the actual math makes the idea of sabotage more than compelling. Was there ever an investigation into the trillion to one failure? Results?
What’s frustrating is that after the first Climate-mission fairing failure NASA and the contractor spent two years and millions of dollars investigating every inch of that fairing mechanism (remember: a mechanism so simple it could open your car door and so over-designed and over-redundant the chance of a single failure is astronomically low). And AFTER all that, the mechanism failed again, on the very next Climate mission (note: the mechanism works fine for military and other missions). After the second failure NASA just went with another contractor. I don’t believe there was ever any further investigation.
Yes the U.S adopted the industrial revolution from those early engineers (like James Watt) and inventors and did their fare share of creating the problem we are now increasingly facing. One saving grace of the U.S is that they have a lions share of Climate Scientists and expertise, and have always been very open and shared their scientific progress and findings with the world. Their Earth science missions are second to none and of benefit to countless people U.S and non U.S alike.
Please do not cut back on NASA’s Earth Science program, not at this time or any other. There is no other organization to replace you or take up the slack ..
“NASA’s satellite data is really helping the developing world, I mean tremendously. That goes a long, long way in terms of making friends and having real impact.”
– Greg Leng, director of RETScreen International Clean Energy Decision Support Center
News May 4, 2015
Bringing NASA satellite data down to Earth
By Bob Silberg,
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory
http://climate.nasa.gov/news/2271/