Bursting a Weather Forecaster’s Balloon

The office, but not the observatory which is owned by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, is on a list of facilities whose leases are set to be terminated. A spokesperson for the Government Services Administration told USA Today that some leases could be continued if it’s determined they are needed.

There’s a small staff of just eight people in Hilo, who manage and maintain instruments that sit at more than 11,000 feet above sea level. The lab’s lease has an annual cost of just above $164,000, according to the website of Elon Musk’s group known as the Department of Government Efficiency or DOGE.

It does not appear that the observatory itself, where the measurements are taken, is on the chopping block by DOGE. However, it’s unknown if the staff could continue their function with no office. DOGE also lists other NOAA facilities for closure including some 24 offices that oversee fishing safety and sustainability in different areas from Washington state to Florida.

DOGE is also cutting back or eliminating weather balloon launches performed by the National Weather Service, which is part of NOAA, in even more locations than had been announced earlier. In the past, the balloons have been released twice a day from around 100 locations to provide weather information for forecasters and computer models, but the number of releases has already been reduced to once a day in some locations after hundreds of employees were either fired or left, according to Newsweek.

The Associated Press reports that the balloons gather information that cannot be retrieved in any other way as they go 100,000 feet into the atmosphere. Marshall Shepherd, a meteorologist wrote in Forbes that he begs for more balloon launches, not less, because the atmosphere is constantly changing and fluid. The National Weather Service has said balloon launches will be stopped in Omaha, Nebraska, and Rapid City, South Dakota, and reduced to once a day at Grand Junction, Colorado, and Green Bay, Wisconsin, among other locations.

The State Department said the denial was because Mexico has not lived up to its obligations to deliver water to the U.S. under a 1944 treaty that benefits farmers in the Rio Grande Valley. Newsweek reports that Mexico had asked for the special delivery to Tijuana outside the framework of the treaty.

According to AFP, American farmers and lawmakers say that Mexico has been coming up short on its obligations to send water to reservoirs along the Rio Grande. Senator Ted Cruz, Republican of Texas, praised the State Department, saying he would work with the administration to pressure Mexico to get water to Texas farmers.

Climate change, population growth, and parched farmlands have made it difficult for Mexico to comply with its treaty obligations, according to its government. It’s the first time the U.S. has refused to help drought-stricken Tijuana.

Rising global temperatures are causing glaciers to retreat at a rapid rate, with five out of the past six years seeing the fastest loss on record, according to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). Their State of the Global Climate 2024 report confirmed that from 2022-2024, there was the largest three-year loss of glaciers on record.  Sounding the alarm, they say much of what used to be called glaciers’ “eternal ice” will not survive the 21st century. A new report was released last week by the UN, “The United Nations World Water Development Report 2025, Mountains and glaciers: water towers.” The United Nations General Assembly declared 2025 as the International Year of Glaciers Preservation.

The WMO says preserving glaciers is not just an environmental and economic necessity. It’s a matter of survival. Mountains and glaciers—the water towers of the world—supply up to 70 percent of global freshwater. They also influence atmospheric circulation, shaping weather and precipitation, so their disappearance—and in many cases their irreversible retreat—will mean increased water scarcity, rising sea levels, and a higher likelihood of natural disasters like floods or landslides.

Glaciologists determine the health of glaciers by measuring how much snow falls on them and then how much melt occurs every year, according to UN partner the World Glacier Monitoring Service (WGMS) at the University of Zurich. The group estimates that based on their observations, glaciers (not including the ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica) have lost a total of more than 9,000 billion tons since records began in 1975—the equivalent of an ice block the size of Germany, 25 meters thick. The largest annual mass loss on record happened in Scandinavia, Svalbard, and North Asia, but a study published last month in the journal Nature found that, at present melt rates, many glaciers in Western Canada, the U.S., Central Europe, and New Zealand will disappear by century’s end.

Part of the publicity for the first World Day for Glaciers included naming the first “Glacier of the Year,” which is the South Cascade Glacier in Washington state. The designation is meant to highlight the beauty of glaciers around the world and to honor the dedication of glaciologists who have been monitoring them for decades.

The animals can live up to 15 years, but in the wild it’s less likely because slowing down in old age can mean being eaten by a shark. But some lucky ducks…or penguins rather…who live at the New England Aquarium in Boston will reach a ripe old age because the facility has set up an old folk’s home of sorts for penguins—or perhaps an old flock’s home?

Last year, the Penguins and Pinnipeds department designated one island in their aquarium habitat specifically for the physical and behavioral needs of older birds. For the geriatric penguins, this means special treatment like being fed fish injected with water to promote kidney health, daily eye drops for cataracts, foot ointments to prevent infections, and even receiving acupuncture and physical therapy.

The tranquil island enclosure has some of the same accoutrements of human assisted living facilities, such as peace and quiet, as well as ramps and flat areas for birds with mobility challenges. Some of the oldest retirees are Harlequin, who’s 32, and Durban who’s 31, so the aquarium seems to be doing a good job at putting old age on ice.