SILVER SPRING, Md. – Early Friday, a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration headquarters employee rushed through the hallway, going about his usual work.
He paused briefly to exchange contact information, offering to connect reporters with former colleagues fired the day before. Less than an hour later, he was fired, and his computer was confiscated.
Hundreds of employees met the same fate Thursday and Friday after the Trump administration abruptly fired them.
Workers scrambled to empty their workspaces and remove personal belongings after receiving termination letters via email.
The Commerce Department, parent agency of NOAA, gave fired employees less than two hours to pack up, turn in their badges and computers and exit the office by 5 p.m., according to a former NOAA employee who spoke to Capital News Service on the condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal.
The email sent to probationary employees stated that they were in a probationary period and that their appointments were not final until that period ended.
“The agency finds that you are not fit for continued employment because your ability, knowledge and/or skills do not fit the agency’s current needs,” said the termination letter obtained by CNS.
A fired probationary employee, a marine biologist who spent eight years with the National Marine Fisheries Service at NOAA, said she received her termination notice while performing daily tasks.
“I was literally in the middle of work when I got the email. I had to immediately stop it (my work). Save it. Back it up. I went into chaos mode,” she said.
She said working at NOAA fulfilled a childhood dream that took years of hard work and decades of education to achieve. As a child, she fell in love with sharks and octopuses swimming in the blue sea, inspiring her to become a marine biologist to preserve species and conserve habitats for future generations.
“The hand, you know, where we were just standing,” a current NOAA employee of six years said, referring to the sculpture of a hand outside of the agency’s headquarters. “The hand of NOAA reaches from the bottom of the oceans to the top of the sky.”
A federal judge on Thursday ruled that terminating probationary federal workers may be illegal and then ordered the Office of Personnel Management to reverse directives for the mass firings of the workers.
Last week, the Office of Personnel Management asked NOAA leadership to write up a justification letter for why employees identified as probationary should be allowed to keep their jobs, a current NOAA employee told CNS.
A current NOAA employee described the atmosphere as unprofessional.
Having spent a third of his career in the private sector, he said the way these layoffs were handled would never have been tolerated before. He added that in recent days, supervisors had been “blindsided,” with employees learning of their terminations from third parties – without their supervisors’ knowledge.
Speaking about a high-level financial analyst recently laid off within his office, he described her work ethic and professionalism as rare and irreplaceable. But he emphasized that employees should not be categorized or treated as disposable in the first place.
“It’s not an exaggeration to say that this loss will put lives at risk,” the source said to CNS. “It’s not just in the weather business, it also has a huge role in the seafood industry and the livelihood to be able to sell products overseas.”
Dr. Rick Spinrad, former under secretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere and former NOAA administrator, stressed the critical role the agency plays during a press conference hosted by Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Maryland.
Spinrad said more than 600 of his colleagues were fired Thursday and added that the full impact would be hard to quantify. With tornado season approaching, along with winter storms, floods and droughts, he said the agency needs more highly qualified employees, not fewer.
Spinrad said NOAA employees maintain Global Positioning System (GPS) satellites and provide weather data that is used to predict flight delays and cancellations.
Van Hollen said he’s working with Montgomery County, specifically Silver Spring, to talk about opportunities to provide laid off federal workers with jobs.
Craig McLean, a former captain on NOAA research ships and the agency’s former assistant administrator for research, said in the press call that the Department of Efficiency (DOGE) is planning to relocate NOAA headquarters as a tactic to get rid of employees.
Van Hollen added under Project 2025, many federal agencies are set to be relocated.
“The Trump administration’s illegal actions to slash NOAA’s workforce – indiscriminately and without cause – will only hurt vital services that Americans depend on. As I made clear to Commerce Secretary (Howard) Lutnick yesterday: this action is flatly illegal,” Van Hollen said in a statement.
Numerous meteorologists took to social media to denounce the firings, many in the National Weather Service.
“NWS has fired meteorologists as a direct result of upper-level heads telling them to do so,” Ethan Clark, a meteorologist for the city of Raleigh, North Carolina, posted on X. “Let me be clear, people will die because of this. Absolutely insane. I have no words for it.”
Ocean Conservancy Vice President Jeff Watters said in a statement: “The indiscriminate firing of employees is going to sabotage NOAA’s ability to do essential work that every single American relies on.”
“NOAA is the eyes and ears for our water and air – the agency tracks our weather and climate; monitors tides and surf forecasts; allows for the safe deployment and navigation of satellites, ships, and doppler radar,” he said. “It acts as a first responder with its weather and hurricane emergency alerts; its tsunami warning centers; its oil spill response capabilities; its marine mammal stranding network; and its harmful algal blooms early warning systems. NOAA even keeps seafood on the table. Americans depend on NOAA each and every day, and so does the health of the ocean.”
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