U.S. House Appropriations Committee to Cut USGS Earthquake Hazards funding 20% below FY2012. OUCH!

According to Kris Pankow, Associate Director of the University of Utah Seismograph Stations:

This level of reduction takes the Earthquake Hazards Program to pre-Loma Prieta days (1989 "World Series" quake in the Bay Area) in absolute dollars and to pre-NEHRP (National Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program - which includes a federal-state cooperative) days when considering inflation. Kris warns that this is potentially a huge blow to the National Seismic System and to earthquake science in the U.S.

Source

Here is a link to the Fiscal Year 2013 Dept. of the Interior appropriations (which includes USGS)

I'm all for cutting the budget, but not from here. Let's just build a few less bombs next year.

Anybody else as peeved as I am?

Well be glad we have members on here that run their own tests with their own equipment, So they can cut the funding but they cant stop us from doing our own tests

reply to post by mytheroy


No doubt. Thanks for your reply.

The seismic networks across the US are working on very tight budgets already. I'm just astonished that lawmakers can't see the value in sustaining the current levels of monitoring, research and hazard preparedness that the USGS provides. Did they not see Fukushima? Aren't we still repairing damage in the Nation's Capitol from the Mag 5.8 last August?
This agency has flaws, but slashing funding seems short-sighted.

This news does not surprise me in the least..... Money will have to be cut so we can go to war or anything else they deem important. Its so twisted anymore.... Just plain twisted.

Thanks for bringing this news to light though.... :-)

i have a family friend who is in the coast guard and they are having a family day where they can bring people on the ship, and im actually going tomorrow, ill try talking to her and her higher ups if they are around and get their take on this. this is in Michigan just on the outskirts of the New Madrid seismic zone so i would think that they would be a little interested in this.

It's odd timing to be doing these particular cuts when we've had activity in areas that historically haven't seen much activity. And have all the odd rumbling sounds. Maybe they want less monitoring to hide all the damage caused by fraccing.

Damn it, it's our tax money. How come none of us feel we ever get a say in how it's spent? The military industrial complex and DHS seem to have a stranglehold, don't they?

Nah, let's just cut food safety inspections, seismic montitoring, and anything else that might actually serve our citizens? Congress can't make cronies rich off of stuff like that.