Scientists celebrate NCAR’s achievements, from averted plane crashes to groundbreaking forecast models
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BOULDER, Colo. — When Ross Vought, the architect of President Donald Trump’s mass firings of federal workers and dismantling of federal agencies, announced the administration’s plans to break up the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, scientists were quick to speak out.
“Dismantling NCAR is like taking a sledgehammer to the keystone holding up our scientific understanding of the planet,” chief scientist of the Nature Conservancy Katharine Hayhoe wrote on social media.
In a post about the plans to dismantle NCAR, Vought said the six-decade-old research center was “one of the largest sources of climate alarmism in the country.” Vought said NCAR’s “vital activities,” like weather research, will move to a different entity or location.
“That essentially sends my BS meter to the max,” said Daniel Swain, a climate scientist with University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources who is a research partner at NCAR.
“These are not cleanly separable topics scientifically,” Swain said about climate and weather. “The climate affects the weather. The weather affects the climate… they're not cleanly separable entities.”
Rocky Mountain PBS interviewed Swain December 17, a day when scientists and meteorologists were closely following extremely high winds along the Front Range. Schools and businesses closed in advance of the storm, and Xcel Energy shut power off in parts of Colorado as a way to limit wildfire risk. Record-high temperatures also elevated the wildfire risk; Denver recorded daily high temperatures above 60 degrees for eight consecutive days, the most in December since 1939.
“The actions that we've taken to hopefully avert fires and damage today, all of that was made possible specifically by exactly the kinds of research … and models produced by NCAR,” Swain said.
With the future of NCAR in question, many people have pointed to the scientific achievements that have come out of the Boulder lab. Swain was quick to mention NCAR’s role in developing landmark climate models.
“NCAR built, for example, the Weather Research and Forecasting Model — the WRF Model — as well as most of the flagship climate models that we've used to understand not just future climate, but the reasons why climate has changed historically,” he said.
Yale epidemiologist Colin Carlson wrote a lengthy thread on social media listing some of the scientific discoveries that NCAR made possible, and The New York Times highlighted NCAR researchers’ discovery of the Madden–Julian oscillation in the 1970s, which allowed forecasters to better predict weather months in advance.
One of the most dramatic discoveries to come out of NCAR has averted an untold number of airplane crashes.
In the 1970s and 80s — and before — hundreds of people died in plane crashes caused by microbursts, a powerful column of sinking air that often accompanies thunderstorms. These downdrafts posed deadly risks to air travel during landings and take-offs. Microburst-induced disasters include 1975’s Eastern Air Lines Flight 66 (113 deaths) and 1982’s Pan Am Flight 759 (153 deaths).
University of Chicago meteorologist Tetsuya "Ted" Fujita (known for the Fujita scale of tornado intensity) is credited as the first person to theorize that powerful, localized downdrafts were causing this carnage on the tarmac.
In 1978, Fujita and NCAR scientists were the first to capture microbursts on radar, confirming Fujita’s theory about their existence. However, the aviation world denied the existence of microbursts for years, even as crashes continued to kill hundreds.
NCAR meteorologist John McCarthy followed in Fujita’s footsteps. He worked for years to convince the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration of microbursts’ danger to airplane travel. The New York Times reported that skeptical FAA officials once walked out of one of McCarthy’s presentations.
In 1987, NCAR began testing a new Doppler radar that predicted dangerous wind shear events and alerted pilots. Thanks to their research, pilots and air traffic controllers now have the technology to avoid these weather events, and pilots are trained in special maneuvers to avert microburst disaster.
“Since the implementation of wind shear alert systems at airports around the globe, there have not been any aircraft accidents caused by wind shear,” according to NCAR. There has not been a microburst-induced crash of a commercial airplane in the United States since 1994.
“NCAR science kind of solved that problem,” Swain said.
Fujita passed away in 1998. McCarthy died in May of this year.
“Dr. McCarthy dedicated his career to understanding the dangers of microbursts and wind shear. What was once an invisible threat in the skies is now a more understood — and more avoidable — phenomenon, thanks to his work,” McCarthy’s grandson, Brandon Murphy, wrote after McCarthy’s passing.
McCarthy’s celebration of life took place at NCAR.
The decision to break up NCAR is a continuation of the Trump administration’s crackdown on climate research. In March, the Department of Government Efficiency, then led by Elon Musk, fired hundreds of workers from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which also has a lab in Boulder.
The following month, a leaked memo revealed the president’s plans to slash more than a quarter of NOAA’s budget and eliminate the agency’s Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research.
Trump-aligned officials used similar justifications for breaking up NCAR as they did when targeting NOAA. The authors of Project 2025, a conservative blueprint for the Trump administration closely aligned with the president’s policies, accused NOAA of being "one of the main drivers of the climate change alarm industry and, as such, is harmful to future U.S. prosperity."
The latest response from the White House suggests that NCAR’s fate is, at least in part, a response to the feud between Trump and Democratic leaders in Colorado over Tina Peters.
“Maybe if Colorado had a governor who actually wanted to work with President Trump, his constituents would be better served,” a senior White House official told CNN and NOTUS.
Swain cautioned against writing NCAR’s obituary.
“This hasn’t happened yet,” he said. “Although the statements from the White House and Russell Vought directly seem pretty definitive, NCAR has not been dismantled and it is not necessarily clear who has the authority and what the administrative process would actually be to do that.”
Vought has targeted Democratic-led states before. In October, during the government shutdown, he used social media to announce the Trump administration was freezing billions of dollars earmarked for infrastructure projects in several states with Democratic governors. But leaders in those states weren’t sure if that was actually going to happen.
Colorado members of Congress are preparing for a battle over NCAR.
Democratic Sen. Michael Bennet, who is also running for Governor of Colorado, said “I will not stand by while Trump weaponizes the federal government to punish our state.”
Rep. Joe Neguse, a Boulder Democrat, said “We will fight this reckless directive with every legal tool we have.”
Type of story: News
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. To read more about why you can trust the journalism of Rocky Mountain PBS, please visit our editorial standards and practices page.
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. To read more about why you can trust the journalism of Rocky Mountain PBS, please visit our editorial standards and practices page.