Without this funding, NOAA loses access to real-time seismic data from the Alaska Earthquake Center the Agency uses to issue tsunami warnings and alerts
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Yesterday, U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA), ranking member of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, and senior member of the Senate Finance Committee, sent a letter to the Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Dr. Neil Jacobs, demanding answers and accountability after NOAA cancelled an approximately $300,000 grant for the Alaska Earthquake Center (AEC). As a result of discontinued funding, the AEC will stop providing real-time seismic data to deliver timely and accurate tsunami warnings for the entire west coast by the end of November.
“NOAA must work to restore seismic information needed for tsunami alerts in Alaska and develop a concrete plan to protect this data in other critical locations from going offline or being delayed,” wrote Sen. Cantwell in the letter to Dr. Jacobs. “On Washington’s coast, a tsunami generated by the Cascadia Subduction Zone could hit communities in 15-30 minutes. Any potential delays in life saving information puts our communities at risk.”
Sen. Cantwell also took the opportunity to press Admiral Kevin Lunday, President Trump’s nominee for Commandant of the U.S. Coast Guard, on how important NOAA data is for the U.S. Coast Guard in keeping service members and civilians safe at a Senate Commerce nominations hearing today: “There’s some talk about tsunami warning systems being cancelled. I would assume you really appreciate tsunami warning systems in the Coast Guard.”
Adm. Lunday responded: “I wasn’t aware of that, ranking member Cantwell, but we rely on tsunami warning because of the Coast Guard units around the Pacific Rim.”
In 2017, Sen. Cantwell authored the Tsunami Warning, Education and Research Act, which was included and passed as an amendment to the Weather Research and Forecasting Innovation Act. President Trump signed Sen. Cantwell’s bill into law, which required NOAA to work with the U.S. Geological Survey and the National Science Foundation to provide rapid and reliable seismic information to the NOAA tsunami forecasting and warning program.
For months, Sen. Cantwell has been sounding the alarm about the real, tangible impacts of budget cuts to NOAA and how stripping the agency of resources actively puts Americans in danger, especially in the face of increasingly extreme weather. In July, she sent a letter to President Donald Trump outlining her five-point plan to bolster the United States’ weather readiness. Her first recommendation was to modernize the nation’s weather data collection infrastructure like radar to collect and compile more data by land, air, space, and sea.
Also in July, after Sen. Cantwell sent the letter to President Trump, she thanked NOAA employees during a meeting of the Commerce Committee for their work to track the risk of a tsunami following an 8.8 magnitude earthquake near Russia and for their work to immediately mobilize alert systems after the earthquake to ensure people on the entire West Coast had up-to-date information to remain safe.
Dear Dr. Jacobs,
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (“NOAA”) decision to cancel grant funding for real-time data from the Alaska Earthquake Center (“AEC”) and operations at nine NOAA-run seismic stations undermines the efficacy and timeliness of NOAA’s Tsunami Warning Centers’ warnings and alerts and puts coastal communities at unnecessary risk. NOAA must work to restore the seismic information needed for tsunami alerts in Alaska and develop a concrete plan to protect this data in other critical locations from going offline or being delayed. On Washington’s coast, a tsunami generated by the Cascadia Subduction Zone could hit communities in 15-30 minutes. Any potential delays in life saving information puts our communities at risk.
With more than 25 years of seismic monitoring, the AEC is an important partner in NOAA’s delivery of timely and accurate tsunami warnings for Washington, Alaska, Hawaiʻi, and the entire West Coast. NOAA informed AEC that it would discontinue funding for the grant in fiscal year 2023 because of budgetary constraints at the National Weather Service; although it appears that NOAA continued receiving real-time seismic data until recently. However, after being notified that the approximately $300,000 grant would again not be renewed in fiscal year 2026, the AEC elected to cease providing real-time seismic data critical to tsunami warnings and alerts.
Without this funding, nine NOAA-run stations in Alaska that monitor tsunami-triggering earthquakes will go offline by the end of the month. And while it is our understanding that NOAA will continue to receive seismic data from the AEC’s additional 250 stations through alternative pathways, the delivery will be delayed. I authored the law that requires NOAA to work with the U.S. Geological Survey and the National Science Foundation to provide “rapid and reliable seismic information” to the NOAA Tsunami forecasting and warning program, because this data is so critical (33 U.S.C. §3203 (b)(7)). Seconds matter during a tsunami, and coastal communities can have as little as 20 minutes to evacuate and prepare for an incoming wave. According to NOAA, in areas of high seismic network density the Tsunami Warning Centers can determine within five minutes of an earthquake whether to issue an alert, and any delay in the data could erode critical time to get people out of harm’s way.
It is imperative that NOAA ensures the continued integrity of our nation’s tsunami preparedness and public safety infrastructure. I am deeply concerned about the risks posed by the cancellation of this grant program. I urge NOAA to immediately restore funding to the AEC and nine seismic stations and to work with AEC and other seismic data providers to ensure that data is delivered to NOAA in real time to improve forecasts and protect the life and safety of our coastal communities.
