Nearly two months after the tragic floods on July 4 in Texas, which killed more than 130 people, Representative Lloyd Dogit, D-Texas said he was still looking for answers to some basic questions about the response of the federal government.
Any of the emergency officials called by the national weather service on the flood night? How exactly did the agency employees make a storm event? How did the vacancies affect the main positions of the local national weather service office, such as the meteorologist in warning coordination, on the result?
In four letters to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and in the fifth to the Ministry of Commerce, a member of the Congress in Austin called for records that would help tell the story of July 4.
“I have never received a written response,” said Dujett, who accuses Stonool agencies for his inquiries.
The congressional family pushes the records highlighting the gaps in public accountability for what happened on that day. In the aftermath of direct floods, independent meteorologists said that the national weather service has issued a timely warning and that its expectations were strong, given the limits of modern prediction technology during the sudden flood events.
What was less clear at the time – and remains until late August – is the effectiveness of the agency from reaching emergency managers and other stakeholders on the ground when the danger on specific locations became clear. Access to “Last Mile” is something, former meteorologists NWS are suffering when the prediction offices are short to employees or exhausted.
“If they had nothing to hide, and Trump’s inclined and burning approach had no effect here, they need to produce records,” Dujet said, in reference to the service of Trump, in a reference to the records he is looking for. “Attracting the audience’s attention is the only way to make the administration respond.”
NOAA nor the Ministry of Commerce did not respond to the suspension requests.
Doggett sent his first message to NOAA on May 20, before flooding. In the letter, which was sent to the Director of NOAA, Laura Grimm, Dujett shared concerns about the vacancy rate in the weather forecast office in Austin/San Antonio. This office supervised the prediction and communication in the areas struck by July storms.
“The average vacancies in the local NWS display the timing of the predictions and warnings that society depends on,” Dujet wrote, and asked about how the agency deals with employee shortages and whether it plans to fill the office roles.
After the flood disaster, follow Doggett with Noaa on July 8 with 15 additional questions about the agency’s response. Dujet said he had received a video meeting on July 11 with Ken Graham, director of the agency.
In a letter sent after the meeting on July 11, and again in a follow -up on July 24, Doggett requested that the agency provide calls, chat records, radar archives and shift records, among other records.
“He said that things were easy to provide,” said Dujett. “I have been asking about it since then and there is no good explanation.”
Executive sub -agencies are allowed to respond according to their estimate of members of Congress who supervises censorship, according to what he said Interpretation of the Ministry of Justice of the Law. But executive agencies often accommodate Congress requests voluntarily.
Dujet said that he is chasing Nawa with calls and texts, and in a letter on August 27 to the Minister of Commerce Howard Lootnick, Dujet accused the Trade Department in a response believed to be prepared by NOAA to address his questions.
“I have been told that answers have been prepared on my inquiries, but it is blocked by your office.” “We have no evidence of NWS preparation, contact and response – or its absence – related to the flood of July 4. He refused to provide a full time in a timely manner, indicates that the administration has something that hides it regarding the treatment of this tragedy.”
Dogit said that four children from Austin were killed in the floods and called for an investigation into the tragedy similar to those performed by the National Safety Council for transportation after major disasters, which is the idea of attracting partisan support.
“If this is 27 children who are lost in a plane crash, then we will have NTSB to conduct a comprehensive investigation for each aspect of the state, federal and local [actions]”I don’t see any indication of a comprehensive evaluation of what happened and did not happen at the federal level,” Dujet said.
NBC News has submitted many requests for the Freedom of Information Law (FOIA) with NOAA, in search of records from NWS. Some of these requests can put records with answers to Doggett questions, but they have not yet been fulfilled.
One of the requests has been included for chat and communications records between the forecasters, as “dedicated to treatment”, according to the website of the public records of the Ministry of Trade. The agency said that there is another request – to obtain information about employment and reduce jobs – it will be processed in batches and publicly issued alongside other similar requests about Texas floods.
“We are working on providing a temporary edition by the beginning of September, with continuous issuances during the end of the year,” wrote Julia Swanson, the agency’s freedom coordinator in updating the August 18 case. “To focus our limited staff resources effectively, all requests for the Freedom of Information Law have been submitted temporarily so that the FOIA NWS team can focus on addressing the Texas flood requests.”