Proposed bill could force federal weather data offline

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Friday, April 22, 2005

A bill introduced last week by Republican Rick Santorum in the US senate, S. 786, could prohibit National Weather Service from publishing free forecasts online.

This would have no effect on The National Hurricane Center as the bill exempts forecasts meant to protect "life and property."

"The weather service proved so instrumental and popular and helpful in the wake of the hurricanes. How can you make an argument that we should pull it off the Net now? What are you going to do, charge hurricane victims to go online, or give them a pop-up ad?" said Dan McLaughlin, a spokesman for Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla.

Barry Myers, executive vice president of AccuWeather a service that currently competes with National Weather Service free forecasts , said “the bill would improve public safety by making the weather service devote its efforts to hurricanes, tsunamis and other dangers”.

Last year the NOAA eliminated a policy that had prohibited them from offering services that could be provided by the private industry.

Sources

• Robert P. King "Feds' weather information could go dark". Palm Beach Post, April 21, 2005
• Terry Turner "Everyone Talks About the Weather, And This Senator Plans to do Something About It". Blogcritics.org, April 21, 2005 01:22 PM
• John Byrne "BAD WEATHER? Senator aiming to nix federal weather forecasts enjoyed AccuWeather money". The Raw Story, Apr. 21, 2005
• ProfFnard "Santorum to Silence NOAA Weather Information". RedState.org, Apr 21st, 2005: 21:18:52
• CowboyNeal "New Bill Would Ban Public NOAA Weather Data". Slashdot, Thursday April 21, @07:01PM

References

The Bill: National Weather Service Duties Act of 2005

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