Zachary Labe has always been fascinated by the weather. As a kid he drew pictures of it and pretended to work for the National Weather Service, giving forecasts to his parents and friends.

It was a big moment when last summer the young climate scientist landed a research position at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), one of the world's most important sites of climate and weather research.

"When I say it's been my dream, I am quite honest about that," said Labe.

The dream ended abruptly last week, when Labe was one of the roughly 800 staff members fired from NOAA. His firing was part of the US administration's wider efforts to slash what US President Donald Trump calls a "bloated" federal workforce in an effort to reduce government spending.

But Labe says his personal loss pales in comparison to the implications not only to climate science around the world but the everyday lives of people in the US.

What the federal agency does touches pretty much everyone in the US, said Tom Di Liberto, a public affairs specialist among those recently fired from NOAA. "Unless you live inside all the time or in a bunker somewhere, NOAA impacts you."

Its vast remit includes monitoring ocean and climate conditions and protecting endangered species. But it's also the primary source of weather data collection in the US, collecting an estimated 6.3 billion observations every day and issuing millions of forecasts and warnings each year through the National Weather Service.

Labe's work involved expanding the use of machine learning and AI to create more accurate forecasts for extreme weather — which is being supercharged around the world by climate change.

US hurricane season starts in just a few months. Fired NOAA workers told DW they were concerned reduced staffing could impair the quality of forecasting, including early........

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