National Weather Service no longer translating products for non-English speakers

The National Weather Service is no longer providing translations of its products after its contract with an artificial intelligence company was allowed to lapse. It’s a change that experts say could put non-English speakers at risk of missing warnings about extreme weather. A weather service spokesman declined to comment on the lapse of the contract. It comes as the weather service’s parent agency, NOAA, is among federal agencies targeted by the Trump administration for aggressive staff and budget cuts. Nearly 68 million people in the U.S. speak a language other than English at home, according to 2019 Census data. d Joseph Trujillo-Falcón, a researcher at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, said not being able to read urgent weather alerts can be a matter of life or death. The National Weather Service is no longer providing translations of its products after its contract with an artificial intelligence company was allowed to lapse. It’s a change that experts say could put non-English speakers at risk of missing warnings about extreme weather. A weather service spokesman declined to comment on the lapse of the contract. It comes as the weather service’s parent agency, NOAA, is among federal agencies targeted by the Trump administration for aggressive staff and budget cuts. Nearly 68 million people in the U.S. speak a language other than English at home, according to 2019 Census data. d Joseph Trujillo-Falcón, a researcher at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, said not being able to read urgent weather alerts can be a matter of life or death.  AP Technology and Science