Guest essay by Eric Worrall
US and Overseas scientists have accused the Trump Administration of criminal obstruction of climate research, because the US government has not immediately stepped in to foot the bill for a replacement satellite.
Donald Trump accused of obstructing satellite research into climate change
Republican-controlled Congress ordered destruction of vital sea-ice probe
Robin McKie, Observer science editor
Sunday 5 November 2017 19.00 AEDT
President Trump has been accused of deliberately obstructing research on global warming after it emerged that a critically important technique for investigating sea-ice cover at the poles faces being blocked.
The row has erupted after a key polar satellite broke down a few days ago, leaving the US with only three ageing ones, each operating long past their shelf lives, to measure the Arctic’s dwindling ice cap. Scientists say there is no chance a new one can now be launched until 2023 or later. None of the current satellites will still be in operation then.
The crisis has been worsened because the US Congress this year insisted that a backup sea-ice probe had to be dismantled because it did not want to provide funds to keep it in storage. Congress is currently under the control of Republicans, who are antagonistic to climate science and the study of global warming.
“This is like throwing away the medical records of a sick patient,” said David Gallaher of the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colorado. “Our world is ailing and we have apparently decided to undermine, quite deliberately, the effectiveness of the records on which its recovery might be based. It is criminal.”
…
Such losses have serious consequences, say researchers. “Sea-ice data provided by satellites is essential for initiating climate models and validating them,” said Andrew Fleming of the British Antarctic Survey. “We will be very much the poorer without that information.”
US taxpayers have been footing the bill for the Defence Meteorological Satellite Programme since 1973. A thank you would have been nice.
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But…..the “science is settled”. We know everything there is to know about global warming and its effects.
Why do we need any climate research at all?
I thought all we really need is the GOES satellites, which provide weather info for weather forecasts. Those are practical and useful.
I guess these “science guys” will just have to traipse up there to the Arctic and do the measuring in loco, instead of sitting comfortably at a desk. They may be out of work soon. Too bad. So sad.
Am I being mean, cruel, spiteful and petty when I say that I have become more and more fed up with the constant ripoffs of tax money by these people? Am I? Tough bananas!!
The Defense Meteorological Satellite Program (DMSP) is the longest running production satellite program ever. In 50 years of service, DMSP satellites have saved billions of dollars and countless human lives as a result of timely weather forecasts.
History
Initially, the DMSP program was highly classified and run by the National Reconnaissance Program (NRP), in support of the CORONA program, and its first reconnaissance satellites. The CORONA satellites took pictures on 70 mm film, and while each satellite carried up to 32,000 feet of film, it eventually would run out and the mission would end when the last film-return capsule re-entered the Earth’s atmosphere over the Pacific. Thus, it was essential to the success of the CORONA mission that timely and accurate DMSP forecasts be made over areas of interest so that cloud-free photography would be possible, taking maximum advantage of film limitations.
About
Today, DMSP is still providing strategic and tactical weather prediction to aid the U.S. military in planning operations at sea, on land and in the air. The satellites, equipped with a sophisticated sensor suite, can:
Image visible and infrared cloud cover
Measure precipitation, surface temperature, and soil moisture
Collect specialized global meteorological, oceanographic, and solar-geophysical information in all weather conditions
The constellation comprises two spacecraft in near-polar orbits, C3 (command, control and communications), user terminals and weather centers. The latest launch occurred on April 3, 2014 when DMSP 19 roared into orbit aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket.
“additional costs to launch a satellite with 1990s technology that the Air Force has previously stated no longer meets its requirements,”
http://spacenews.com/senate-spending-bill-backs-house-recommendation-to-shelve-dmsp-f20/
If the DEFENSE department does not want the satellite, then let it DIE. Your argument is rediculous. It’s like arguing a homeowner has to keep his land line for his phone because someone put it in in 1950 and it still works. It’s their house, their choice. Same with the satellite.
Sheri my argument is simple.
people who think this was a climate science satellite dont know what they are talking about.
it was a defense satillite.
Mosh is absolutely right about that. DMSP – Defense Meteorological Satellite Program
https://heasarc.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/heasarc/missions/dmsp.html
read it again latitude.
Mosh..stop firing blanks in my direction…..makes you look stupid
Years ago Air Force says they don’t want it….it’s outdated 1990’s tech….Obama is the one that started the defunding process….F20 was the last one…….climate scientists…ice counters….whatever are using outdated tech
Again we see that the AGW climate boffins KNEW that the Defence system was finishing, and did not deem it important enough to find a pittance out of all the TRILLIONS spend on the AGW farce to do anything about it.
Thank you SO MUCH for bringing this to everyone’s attention, Mosh !!
Lat, Mosh fires lemons, not blanks. !!
LOL….I rather Mosh ‘splain this
“”But last year, things began to go awry. The DoD, NASA and National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) were relying on F-17, when it began breaking down. Scientists immediately turned to F-19 for data, the latest in the series, but F-19 went caput shortly thereafter, leading to a coverage gap spanning several months last spring.””
Where was that “coverage gap” spanning several months?………did they just make up Wadhams?
Steven: Are you saying the article should have said it was a defense satellite, NOT a climate science one? I think they should have been clear on that, too. Then people would have known that the Air Force had the ownership of it and that climate science had no claim on it.
Latitude November 5, 2017 at 12:47 pm
Where was that “coverage gap” spanning several months?
From April 2016 onwards:
http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/2016/04/sensor-on-f-17-experiencing-difficulties-sea-ice-time-series-temporarily-suspended/
The Cryosphere Today SeaIce area never restarted.
I don’t understand the problem. Instrumentation to measure surface temperatures hasn’t existed in most of the world, so they simply make up data. Maybe they’re just mad because that takes more work than simply manipulating/ignoring real data.
So only the US can do this? Why didn’t Cambridge U buy the back up, have UK foot the bill to send it up and put their Arctic specialist Dr. Wacky Wadhams in charge..
https://worldtruth.tv/list-of-dead-scientists-assassinated/
Why we’d want to lose this guy I don’t know! I’d suspect his fellow warmologists would be more likely suspects.
only US and only Trump. Not Obama, not Trudeau. Not Merkel, Xi, Putin.
Its a US Military weather satellite.
the Military is good enough to share its data
but the PRIMARY PURPOSE of this satellite is MILITARY, not ice
Maybe it WAS, but apparently it is NOT Now. Besides, the US MILITARY has in Recent Years had a HABIT of cozying up to the WARMIST Establishment, but it has been SELF-SERVING.
See how that works?
Fine, the DEFENSE department DOES NOT WANT IT. Case closed.
So where are those spending all the money on the AGW farce.
Its almost as if the DON’T WANT a new satellite for Arctic sea ice.
There are plenty of other types of commercial satellite.
Could that be because they KNOW the AMO is starting to turn and want to HIDE the increase in Arctic sea ice over the next decade or more?
From used cars, to used satellites.
What is next for you, Mosh.
DMSP’s primary mission is real time weather photography, particularly for the Navy. DMSP spacecraft are derivatives of TIROS-N spacecraft. Nice comparison from 2000: http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a165118.pdf
It also has a number of secondary sensors, such as ELT receivers for downed aircraft. Some others are classified.
As is normal with the military, old programs are often terminated for new ones. Sometimes old systems are extended until the new tech is deployed. A lot of hardware up there, no doubt there are other spacecraft with competing sensors.
Gary Pearse. November 5, 2017 at 6:01 am
So only the US can do this? Why didn’t Cambridge U buy the back up, have UK foot the bill to send it up and put their Arctic specialist Dr. Wacky Wadhams in charge..
The UK is a member of EUMETSAT which has satellites of their own, in fact due to the failure of F19 it is that satellite that the Air Force has to rely on for coverage of Middle East weather data.
Let’s get Elon Musk on the problem. I’m sure he can pull another wabbit out of his hat.
Throwing away the medical records of a sick patient?
NO
More like refusing to buy any more liquor for an alcoholic or a lush.
+97
+ 197 ! 🙂
Where are our lawyer friends?
I ask because:
How is Mr Trump being ‘criminal’?
He is simply choosing how, where and when to spend money. Like everyone does every day of the week.
Its called prudence. What the Pilgrim Fathers were very keen upon – they planned their expedition from where I am right now, Worksop in Notts.
Use of the word ‘Criminal’ is exaggeration.
And as any lawyer will tell you as you give evidence or compose a statement:
“Don’t exaggerate – it destroys your credibility”
Are you gonna tell them or should I…..
Time to shift the Tesla subsidies. It would make progressives heads explode.
It’s becoming more than a little obvious that the reason they want ever more money to “study” climate in these remote locations is solely for the purpose of looking for “bad” things going on in places where there aren’t any people around who might dispute the exact nature and magnitude of the word “bad”. Of course they have to report something “bad” or there won’t be anymore funding to justify looking for more “bad” things in the future. After all, how much money would Congress earmark to study how much “better” things are getting?
The biggest valid reason to study arctic sea ice that I can think of is for the US Navy for the purpose of national security which has been going on since the 50’s. Beyond that there are activities like commercial shipping, fishing and oil exploration to name a few but I’m coming up short to explain why tax payers should have to foot the bill for them beyond the weather forecasting they already have?
The “bad” thing will be the increase in Arctic sea ice as the AMO starts to turn downwards.
The demise of these satellite is very timely, wouldn’t you say.
Its like the climate science community putting their hands over their eyes and going la-la-la……
Using the WUWT seaice reference page as a starting point it appears that there are other nations observing arctic sea ice by satellite . For example the Japanese Shizuki satellite as in this news release of a few months ago :
“Feb. 21, 2017 Updated
GCOM-W: Sea Ice Hits Record Low
Global sea ice extent hit record low, according to observations from Shizuku on Global Change Observation Mission on January 14, 2017. It is all time low in the history of satellite operation that started in 1978, JAXA continues operation of Shizuku and GCOM-C and monitoring arctic sea ice extent, off the coast of Greenland Sea and the rest of the arctic circle.
Related information is also available at the following links:
JASMES:JAXA Satellite Monitoring for Environmental Studies
Data archives of the arctic circle”
And from what source does the Danish Meteorological Institute derives its data – again displayed on the WUWT reference pages.
Given the obsession with global warming by billionaires like Soros and Gore and numerous Hollywood “stars” why do they not form a not for profit consortium to launch new satellites. They would get tax breaks no doubt for this public service.:
Hmmmm….https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SRbvSFtsN_8
It did seem a bit of a silly thing to destroy an allegedly working, backup satellite even if the technology is out of date. Really, how much did it cost to store? Now there’s a very expensive pickle. I’m sure the satellite was more useful than just measuring the ice at the poles.
Maybe the rest of the world could have found a closet to store it in. (sigh)
It was not designed or launched to study ice. it is a military weather satellite. the program has been in place since 1962
It’s 1990’s technology…..has cost around $1/2 billion to keep it in storage….when the Ari Force wanted more money for new satellites even the Air Force said it’s out dated technology that they no longer want or need…if they had spent that $1/2 billion on new technology…you would have the new toys you want already
I’m 100% behind the Trump administration on this…..you would keep a 1990’s computer would you?
Again, Mosh. If its SO IMPORTANT, why haven’t the “climate worriers” got together and done something about it.
Heck Mosh, even you could have some used car parts floating about you could contribute. !
SM,
The refrain about it being a military satellite is getting tiresome. Sheri has summed it up appropriately. It is the military’s call what to do with the program, even if it doesn’t make people studying polar ice happy. End of story!
It’s not a ‘closet’. It is a carefully climate-controlled, particle-controlled, high-security facility. You don’t want dust on the sensors.
In addition, there is maintaining a cadre of engineering SMEs for the satellite. These are NOT just launch and forget – any engineer can do it. Re-training a new set of engineers would be cost prohibitive, and still not get you the all the background information from the people who actually oversaw its design and production.
Storage includes cost of monitoring/replacing batteries. Yes, even when they’re not being used, batteries age out of performance requirements. Replacements can be expensive, especially if the technology is out of date, and the factory has to be rebuilt.
“At present three ageing satellites – DMSP F16, F17 and F18 – remain in operation, though they are all beginning to drift out of their orbits over the poles. The latest satellite in the series, F19, began to suffer sensor malfunctions last year and finally broke down a few weeks ago. It should have been replaced with the F20 probe, which had already been built and was being kept in storage by the US Air Force. However it had to be destroyed, on the orders of the US Congress, on the grounds that its storage was too costly.”
This is really dumb
these satellites have been operating since the 1962 Its One of the sources that I use to look at urbanization because they are the source of nightlights data. More importantly the satellites serve a military purpose.
No you loot at data, even though you don’t need to because you are not a scientist.
You have no link to the satellite whatsoever, you are here being pretentious and posing as a scientist lol
Mosher being pretentious? My world view of Mosher saving the earth through krigging has been shattered. It may take a few seconds to digest that. OK. I’m better. LOL
The satellites do not belong to climate researchers. Tough that the defense people don’t want the satellite anymore. Have climate believers pay for a new satellite and stop going for a free ride on other’s equipment.
“these satellites have been operating since the 1962 ”
Where is that Satellite sea ice data , Mosh. !!
INCONVENIENT ???????
And yes, we all know how badly done that urbanization farce of yours was..
FAILED LOGIC from the start.
Then go back to using a 1962 computer for your Weed Patch Wandering, Mr. Mosher.
David Gallaher of the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder sez: “Our world is ailing and we have apparently decided to undermine, quite deliberately, the effectiveness of the records on which its recovery might be based. It is criminal.”
My word. With such fact-free ideology-based emotionalism, Gallaher has shown himself to be not only incompetent, but unworthy to be called a scientist. He should be fired forthwith.
Here is everything we lost by destroying this military satellite
https://ngdc.noaa.gov/eog/dmsp.html
Mosh cares about satellites except when it comes to temp anomalies 😀
Why is someone educated in literature or something, worried about satellites.
Give your demonstration of actual scientific understanding, this changes your life and work in no way whatsoever 😀
We lost 1990’s technology…that the Air Force has said no longer meets it’s requirements……
http://spacenews.com/senate-spending-bill-backs-house-recommendation-to-shelve-dmsp-f20/
Latitude November 5, 2017 at 8:19 am
We lost 1990’s technology…that the Air Force has said no longer meets it’s requirements……
It’s the same technology they’re relying on now, if the existing satellites fail they will have nothing which is why the Air Force wanted to launch F20. The absence of satellite monitoring certainly doesn’t meet their requirements!
Go to https://ngdc.noaa.gov/eog/dmsp/download_cti.html then click (at your peril) on the link they give for “Coral Triangle Initiative (CTI).
What in the world is THAT? (a hacked site?)
It BELONGS TO THE MILITARY. What part of CLIMATE SCIENTISTS DON’T OWN IT do you not understand???? Are you trying to be ignorant or stubborn or what?
It belongs to the American tax payer.
Here is everything we lost
=======
polar ice is not in the list.
It was a piece of out-dated JUNK.
No wonder you are trying so hard to sell it, Mosh !
Why isn’t sea ice listed?
If a satellite falls out of the sky, does that mean there’s no more ice?
Oh dear, Trump wants us all to die – apparently. And it’s not just the belief of the CAGW Green Blob. Check out this recent AP article complaining about Trump dropping a vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) mandate for new cars. Ignore the rather cartoonish headline “APNewsBreak: Gov’t won’t pursue talking car mandate” and read on:
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_TALKING_CARS
“The Trump administration has quietly set aside plans to require new cars to be able to wirelessly talk to each other, auto industry officials said, jeopardizing one of the most promising technologies for preventing traffic deaths.”
The article essentially says V2V will prevent car crashes and save thousands of lives. Maybe, maybe not. Given the growing list of hacked Internet of Things (IoT) devices, it seems to me that V2V would be “Disneyland on Wheels” for the hacker community, thus rendering V2V useless at best, dangerous at worse. But it’s all Trump’s fault, of course. 😉
You had almost the same number of deaths to guns as vehicles for 2016 around 32,000 to 33,000.
However one is you right and that is okay, but not dealing with the other and they are trying to kill you 🙂
Well over half the deaths from firearms in the US were suicides. Think Obama’s “blue pill”.
Anyone who has worked with computers and is honest will tell you computers running virtually everything is a bad idea. The cars with “auto braking”? What happens the first time a driver gets in a car without that? Odds are good he’s accustomed to the car “saving” him and he doesn’t automatically go for the brakes. Computers tend to make people careless and unobservant. It will not end well.
“Computers tend to make people careless and unobservant.”
Is that a dig at “climate science” 😉
and yes even solar data
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2002JA009452/abstract
Solar data? Equatorial plasma bubbles form at night. Keep trying.
This Arctic Sea Ice, that MUST be studied, how many people has it killed the last thirty years?
‘with only three ageing ones . . . to measure the Arctic’s dwindling ice cap’
Pretense of science ended. Can we get one that will measure increasing ice cap?
The Russians have several Arctic sea ice satellites.
If only the US hadn’t spent the last 4 years alienating them, they could have asked to share the data.
I’m sure that the US military would be really happy relying on the Russians for operational weather reports in Syria! They’re currently relying on an aging European satellite in the Middle East.
Global warming is making the world dangerously….better?
“This is like throwing away the medical records of a sick patient,” said David Gallaher of the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colorado.
Who is an hysterical ninny. Nothing is being thrown away.
Besides. THE SCIENCE IS SETTLED. There is no reason to spend more money on climate science.
It’s actually more like throwing away the medical records of someone who’s perfectly healthy!
Steven Mosher November 5, 2017 at 7:12 am
So you’re saying that the Guardian claim that this satellite is for “research into climate change” is false, and that the satellite is strictly for defense? Or is your point that the satellite was not built for climate research, but for WEATHER research?
Or is your point something else entirely?
Mosh, your haiku posting style does not serve you well. It leaves folks far too free to project anything onto your words, or to simply misunderstand them. Look, you’re a very smart guy … but I could read your minuscule postings for fifty years and never figure that out. You put words on the page as though each one cost you $100 … and your parsimony is assuredly not doing your reputation any good.
w.
He must find it hard typing with one foot permanently in his mouth !!
said Andrew Fleming of the British Antarctic Survey. “We will be very much the poorer without that information.”
≠≠===========
so why are the Brits asking the US to pay? if the Brits had to pay they would be “very much the poorer” if they had the information.
More precisely:
Sea-ice data provided by satellites is essential to justify the funds for climate models that keep the consensus stance afloat with NASA-sanctioned, official numbers. … We will be very much the poorer without that information, because the models that use it will no longer enable us to make our livings as “climate scientists”.
The hilarious part is modelers specifically avoid validating their models to observation.
Climate models are not validated. Were they, this whole CAGW meme would have died years ago.
First, I don’t know anything about old satellites (weather or defense), except what I can glean from various articles. Over at nasa.gov and noaa.gov they refer to the pending launch on November 10 from Vandenberg AFB of NASA/NOAA’s Joint Polar Satellite System-1 (JPSS-1). If it has been referenced above, I missed it. Is this satellite designed to do whatever F20 was expected to do in regard to sea ice, but do it more thoroughly?
http://www.jpss.noaa.gov
After roaming around Wikipedia for a bit, it appears the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program (DMSP) discussed above was to have a follow-on program, Defense Weather Satellite System (DWSS). DWSS was cancelled by the US Air Force in 2012. Along with the JPSS, the two programs would comprise the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental System (NPOESS). Just the JPSS is continuing forward.
Based on the fact the USAF cancelled DWSS during President Obama’s first term, and JPSS-1 is about to launch, it would appear President Obama permitted climate obstruction and President Trump is permitting climate research advancement.
Windsong November 5, 2017 at 2:09 pm
After roaming around Wikipedia for a bit, it appears the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program (DMSP) discussed above was to have a follow-on program, Defense Weather Satellite System (DWSS). DWSS was cancelled by the US Air Force in 2012.
The cancellation was due to interagency disagreements on the specification of the new system.
As a result even though the Pentagon requested $444.9 billion for research and development for DWSS in fiscal 2012, lawmakers provided only $43 million and directed the Air Force that it be used for shutting down the contract. The Air Force wasn’t too worried because they felt that with the two already built satellites, F19 and F20, they would have sufficient time to bring up a new system without a gap in the weather data collection system. Of course when F19 failed they were forced into considering launching F20 which they’d hoped not to do, the congressional committee however ordered the Air Force not to launch F20 and dismantle it. The JPSS was NOAA’s response to the cancellation of DWSS whereby they were able to launch the sensors that they’d wanted in DWSS.
Research what? We’ve heard for quite a while that the science of CAGW has been settled.
The Observer Science Editor displays ignorance by referring to “the Arctic’s dwindling ice cap”.
Ice caps occur on land.
The Arctic has an ice pack.