An annual on the evolving threat of hurricanes kicked off in New Orleans on Monday, but without the usual presence of experts from the federal government due to cost-saving measures put in place by President Donald Trump's administration.
The conference is also taking place with the White House reportedly planning , which oversees the nation’s hurricane and weather forecasting services.
Weather forecasters, hurricane researchers and emergency responders from agencies across the country convene at the National Hurricane Conference to discuss past storms and strategies to improve preparedness in the face of a changing climate and intensifying disasters. Officials with agencies such as NOAA and the Federal Emergency Management Agency typically attend, leading discussions and offering presentations and training sessions.
But events that were supposed to be led by NOAA and FEMA officials this year have been canceled or reworked. by the Trump administration are to blame for the lack of representation, according to National Hurricane Conference media coordinator Rebecca Mueller and other sources close to NOAA.
“It’s critical for them to be here,” said Julie Roberts, a former NOAA official who now operates a private sector company geared toward disaster relief. “They need to be here to talk about what is going on.”
Roberts served as NOAA’s deputy director of communications under Trump’s first administration and worked at FEMA under the Bush administration. She has attended the conference each year for the past decade or more, and said NOAA and FEMA officials share critical information there, helping them better prepare and strategize for the upcoming hurricane season.
Roberts said failing to do so could result in less accurate forecasts, worse storm preparations, and, ultimately, lives and property lost in natural disasters. Since Trump took office, of staffing and funding cuts. Last week, the administration proposed to eliminate the agency’s research arm,
“I think we can all agree that we need to look at how to make cuts to the government, every agency,” Roberts said. “But you need to do it with a scalpel, not a sledgehammer.”
Officials with NOAA did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
John Wilson, chairman of the conference, opened Monday’s general session with a note about the unusual circumstances.
“We hope this is just a one-year happenstance that we’re facing this year and we’ll see our friends and folks and comrades next year at our conference in Orlando,” Wilson said.
A conference amid cuts
For the nearly 1,600 people who were able to attend, the conference began with emergency managers, elected officials and meteorologists recounting lessons learned during Hurricane Katrina and the critical importance of storm preparedness as extreme weather becomes more common. Much of this year's conference, which runs through Thursday, centers on the 20th anniversary of the destructive storm and accompanying levee failures that flooded 80% of New Orleans.
There was little public mention of the lack of federal employees during event's opening day. Trump's acting FEMA administrator, Cameron Hamilton, did attend and speak, stressing the importance of local, community-centered disaster response and cutting the red tape that often makes it difficult to reach people in the aftermath of storms.
“The best responders to disasters are those who know their communities best,” Hamilton said. He pointed to efforts following Hurricane Helene last year that “enabled residents to work more directly with survivors.”
“In some circumstances, we literally employed survivors to help survivors,” he said. “This is the community approach and framework we want to achieve and pursue.”
FEMA is among a slew of federal agencies cutting landmark programs and terminating employees. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem even proposed eliminating the agency altogether. Last week, FEMA announced that it will end the Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities, or BRIC, program, which Louisiana relies on heavily to build levees, elevate homes and conduct other mitigation projects.
20 years after Katrina
Speakers only hinted at the broader political climate, focusing instead on lessons learned from Katrina and the importance of pushing forecasting and emergency response technology forward in a world increasingly threatened by extreme weather.
Margaret Orr, the recently retired WDSU meteorologist, choked up as she recalled the destruction brought to New Orleans two decades ago.
She described frantically pulling her favorite paintings off the walls of her Lakeview home, packing up her entire wardrobe and gathering up beloved photographs as she prepared to evacuate to the Hilton Riverside Hotel, where several WDSU employees were hunkering down through the storm.
S. Broad Street, August 29, 2005. Something was wrong. The hurricane had passed earlier and it had not rained in hours. So why was the water still rising? Later that day we learned that levees had failed and the city was filling with water. John Rainey, John Rainey, Jr. and Courtney Davis became the first heroes I photographed after Katrina. At least that’s what Terry Fox called them after they helped her evacuate the children. -- John McCusker
“I think words have a hard time expressing the destruction, the fear, the hopelessness that we went through,” Orr said.
It was an emotional start for many of those gathered at the conference, and Orr warned that solid weather forecasts have never been more important.
“We are seeing more extreme tornadoes – that EF-4 recently. We are seeing extreme droughts, 30 inches of rain below average, 17 100-degree days in 2023, saltwater intrusion, that terrible fog event where 167 cars crashed and seven people died,” Orr said. “We now have had two Cat 4 hurricanes within two years of 150 mph: Laura and Ida. But Katrina was the worst.”
Others echoed the theme, highlighting emergency management wins during Katrina and Milton and advancements in recording video footage from the worst parts of storms in real time.
Jefferson Parish President Cynthia Lee Sheng speaks to hundreds of attendees at the 2025 National Hurricane Conference.
Jefferson Parish President Cynthia Lee Sheng, who was first elected to the position in 2020, said she was “the poster child” for new politicians being faced with the realities of intense and unexpected extreme weather events – from hurricanes to wildfires to unprecedented snow. Emergency preparedness can be “a backburner issue” for areas spared from recent disasters, Lee Sheng said, but this is a big mistake.
“We’re in a different world right now,” she said. “We all know this.”
