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National Weather Service is resuming translations for non-English speakers

This ominous-looking wall of clouds formed near Purcell, Okla., on Thursday. There were more tornadoes in Oklahoma and Arkansas as severe weather continued to pummel those states.
Alonzo Adams
/
AP
File: An ominous-looking wall of clouds.

The National Weather Service is resuming translations for non-English speakers.

The National Weather Service stopped providing translations earlier this month because a contract with an AI translation provider had ended. The service provided Spanish, Chinese, French, Vietnamese and Samoan translations of forecasts and warnings.

The contract ended as the Trump administration hopes to slash federal funding, including jobs at the weather service’s parent agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

More than 68 million people in the U.S. speak a language other than English. In North Carolina, that includes nearly one million people, about 10% of the population.

These services are important for non-English speakers during severe weather.