'Essential' but unpaid National Weather Service employees insert secret message into nightly bulletin

Someone at the National Weather Service's Alaska bureau has a message for those who have shut down the government: "PLEASE PAY US."

As is evident from the image above -- taken directly from the National Weather Service's bulletin log -- someone in the Anchorage office encoded the nightly weather forecast with their plea.

Raw Story contacted the Anchorage office, but was told that "no one wanted to comment right now."

Although many National Weather Service employees are considered "essential" and are therefore exempted from the furloughs caused by the government shutdown.

However, as Dan Sobien, present of the NWS Employee Organization told Popular Science, these "essential" employes aren't being paid.

"There's no money to pay them," he said. "Nobody knows when anyone's going to get paid."

In the meantime, these employees are being issued IOUs if they work despite the lack of compensation for their labor.

[Image via AFP]