Climate scientist Tom Di Liberto had dreamed of working at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) since college. After more than a decade as a contractor, he finally secured a full-time position nearly two years ago.
Last week, he was among hundreds abruptly fired in a sweeping government purge which, critics warn, will delay hurricane forecasts, cripple climate research and disrupt vital fisheries.
Still more workers have accepted deferred resignation "buyouts" offered by Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency, and even deeper cuts are expected imminently.
"This is the dream job -- everything I want to do with my life," Di Liberto told AFP.
The 40-year-old father of two, who worked on the El Nino–La Nina cycle, was just days short of his two-year anniversary -- a milestone that would have protected him from the first round of probationary workers cuts.
"We knew it was coming," he said. "But it's never good to get such a dry, cold, callous email saying you were fired because your skills weren't needed."
A NOAA engineer, requesting anonymity for fear of losing her job, said the cuts were already taking a toll. Half of her satellite forecasting team was laid off because they were probationary, meaning malfunctioning satellites won't be restored as quickly.
"People won't be evacuated on time from natural disasters," she said. "They could lose property -- or their lives."
Around 700 NOAA employees -- out of a 12,000-strong workforce -- have been fired, though the agency has not confirmed a final number. According to The New York Times, the total, including resignations, could soon reach 20 percent of staff.
The Trump administration appears to be following Project 2025, a conservative policy blueprint that calls NOAA one of the "main drivers of the climate change alarm industry" and proposes breaking it up.
It also seeks to privatize the National Weather Service (NWS), forcing Americans to rely on commercial services.
"Significant elements of Project 2025 have already been implemented, despite Donald Trump disavowing any knowledge of it," Democratic congressman Jamie Raskin of Maryland told AFP, vowing continued protests and legal action.
"This is being carried out in a completely lawless and irresponsible manner."
Some of those fired held leadership roles, including Sarah Cooley, 47, who was director of NOAA's Ocean Acidification Program. A longtime academic and nonprofit leader, she said climate science stagnated under Trump's previous term, though states and nonprofits worked to fill the gap.
"But at the end of the day, loss of the work at the federal level can have a very extensive effect," she told AFP.
While states and philanthropic organizations can fund research, they don't fly planes into hurricanes or maintain oceanographic expeditions -- at least not at NOAA's level, she added.
NOAA scientists play a crucial role in marine conservation and fisheries management, collecting data on fish stocks and monitoring ecosystem changes to set catch limits and other policies.
"If they aren't there to do their important jobs, these fisheries may not go forward, they may not open for the year," Gib Brogan, a fisheries expert at nonprofit Oceana, told AFP.
He warned that the economic fallout for coastal communities could be severe.
But it is NOAA's role as a cornerstone of global climate monitoring that has made it a prime target.
"NOAA currently plays a major role as the clearinghouse for global climate data," Zeke Hausfather, a climate scientist at The Breakthrough Institute told AFP.
Its datasets inform major climate groups, he said, warning that severe cuts would amount to "willfully blinding ourselves to avoid the uncomfortable truth about the rapid changes the world is experiencing."
As uncertainty looms, researchers worldwide are scrambling to preserve NOAA's data.
"I am aware of several research groups that have preemptively downloaded the current version of their NOAA datasets of interest to mitigate some of the risks," Leonard Borchert, a climate statistician at the University of Hamburg, told AFP.
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© Agence France-Presse