U.S. tsunami warning system, reeling from funding and staffing cuts, is dealt another blow

Nine seismic stations in Alaska are expected to go dark this month, leaving tsunami forecasters without important data to determine whether an earthquake will send a destructive wave heading toward the West Coast.

The stations relied on a federal grant that expired last year; this fall, the Trump administration refused to renew it. Data from the stations helps researchers determine the size and shape of earthquakes along the Alaska Subduction Zone, a fault that can produce some of the world’s most powerful earthquakes and endanger California, Oregon, Washington and Hawaii.

The loss of the stations could cause Alaska’s coastal communities to have a delay in knowing about an impending tsunami, according to Michael West, director of the Alaska Earthquake Center. And more remote communities, like in Washington state, might get less accurate forecasts.

“Statistically speaking, the last national tsunami came from Alaska, and the next one probably will,” he said.

It’s the latest blow to the U.S. tsunami warning system, which was already struggling with disinvestment and understaffing. Researchers have expressed concern that the network is starting to collapse.

“All the things in the tsunami warning system are going backwards,” West said. “There is a complex problem.”

The United States has two tsunami warning centers – one in Palmer, Alaska, and the other in Honolulu – that operate 24 hours a day and make forecasts that help emergency managers determine whether coastal evacuations are necessary after an earthquake. Data from Alaska seismic stations have always been populated by the centers.

Both centers are already understaffed. Of the 20 full-time positions in Central Alaska, only 11 are currently filled, according to Tom Fahy, legislative director for the National Weather Service Employees Organization union. In Hawaii, four of 16 roles are open. (Both sites are in the process of hiring scientists, Fahy said.)

Additionally, the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration reduced funding for the National Tsunami Hazard Mitigation Program, which funds the majority of states’ tsunami risk reduction work. The agency provided $4 million in 2025, far less than the $6 million it historically provided.

“He’s on life support,” West said of the program.

On top of that, NOAA fired Corina Allen, manager of the National Weather Service’s tsunami program, as part of the Trump administration’s layoff of probationary workers in February, according to Harold Tobin, the Washington state seismologist. Allen, who had recently joined the agency, declined to comment through a spokesperson for his new employer, the Washington State Department of Natural Resources.

These recent cuts came as part of the Trump administration’s broader efforts to reduce federal spending on climate science and research, among other areas. NOAA laid off hundreds of workers in February, reduced weather balloon launches and halted research into the costs of climate and weather disasters, among other reductions.

Most of Alaska’s closed seismic stations are in remote areas of the Aleutian Islands, West said. The range extends west from the Alaska Peninsula toward Russia, tracing a submarine subduction zone. KHNS, a public radio station in Alaska, was the first to announce that the stations would be taken offline.

A NOAA grant of about $300,000 each year had supported the stations. The Alaska Earthquake Center applied for a new grant through 2028, but it was denied, according to an email between West and NOAA staff viewed by NBC News.

Kim Doster, a NOAA spokeswoman, said the federal agency stopped providing money in 2024 under the Biden administration. In the spring, the University of Alaska Fairbanks released funds to maintain the program for another year, estimating that the federal government would ultimately cover the cost, said Uma Bhatt, a professor at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and associate director of the research institute that administered the grant. But new funds never materialized.

“The loss of these observations does not prevent the Tsunami Warning Center from being able to carry out its mission,” Doster said. “The AEC [Alaska Earthquake Center] is one of several partners supporting the National Weather Service’s tsunami operations, and the NWS continues to use numerous mechanisms to provide seismic data collection throughout the state of Alaska.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

West said the Alaska Earthquake Center provides the majority of data used for tsunami warnings in the state. The grant that supported the nine seismic stations also funded a data stream containing information from other sensors at the center, according to West. National tsunami warning centers will no longer have direct access to the stream.

West said the Aleutian Islands stations cover a wide geographic area.

“There’s nothing else around,” he said. “It’s not like there’s another instrument 20 miles away. There’s no road.”

The plan is to abandon the stations later this month and leave their equipment in place, West added.

Washington state’s Tobin said he was concerned that the closures “could delay or degrade the quality of tsunami warnings.”

“It’s a lightly policed ​​area. We kind of need to have a stethoscope over this area,” he said, adding, “These programs sit in the background until a major, terrible event happens.”

The Alaska-Aleutian subduction zone is one of the most active faults in the world and has produced significant tsunamis in the past. In 1964, a tsunami caused by a magnitude 9.2 earthquake killed 124 people, including 13 in California and five in Oregon, according to NOAA. Most of California’s deaths occurred in Crescent City, where a 21-foot wave destroyed 29 blocks, according to the city’s website.

Tsunami experts said stations in the Aleutian Islands are key to quickly understanding nearby earthquakes. The closer an earthquake is to a sensor, the less uncertainty there is about a subsequent tsunami.

NOAA’s tsunami warning centers aim to issue an initial forecast within five minutes, West said, which is critical for local communities. (A strong earthquake in the Aleutian Islands could send an initial wave to neighboring Alaskan communities within minutes.) The only data available quickly enough to inform these initial forecasts comes from seismic signals (rather than tide gauges or pressure sensors attached to buoys).

The warning centers then broadcast a more accurate forecast of wave height after about 40 minutes. Daniel Eungard, tsunami program manager for the Washington Geological Survey, said not having Alaska’s sensors would create more uncertainty about expected wave heights, complicating evacuation decisions along the Washington state coast.

“We try not to evacuate too much,” he said, adding that it costs time, money and trust if warnings prove unnecessary.

Over the past year, national tsunami warning centers have had their work cut out for them. A magnitude 7.0 earthquake near Cape Mendocino, California, triggered tsunami warnings along the state’s coast in December. In July, a magnitude 8.8 earthquake off Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula triggered a widespread alert along the U.S. west coast. The peninsula is just west of the Aleutian Islands.

NOAA has helped build many of the seismic stations that are part of the Alaska Seismic Center network. But West said the agency has diminished its support over the past two decades; nine stations built by NOAA were decommissioned in 2013.

“It’s now or never whether NOAA is part of it or not,” he said. “What I really want to do is spark a discussion about efforts in the United States to deal with the tsunami and prevent this from being triggered by the next devastating tsunami.”

This article was originally published on NBCNews.com