The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said Monday it is delaying by one month the planned cutoff of satellite data that helps forecasters track hurricanes.

Meteorologists and scientists warned of severe consequences last week when NOAA said, in the midst of this year’s hurricane season, that it would almost immediately discontinue key data collected by three weather satellites that the agency jointly runs with the Defense Department.

The Defense Meteorological Satellite Program’s microwave data gives key information that can’t be gleaned from conventional satellites. That includes three-dimensional details of a storm, what’s going on inside of it and what it is doing in the overnight hours, experts say.

The data was initially planned to be cut off Monday “to mitigate a significant cybersecurity risk,” NOAA’s announcement said. The agency now says it’s postponing that until July 31. Peak hurricane season is usually from mid-August to mid-October.

NOAA didn’t immediately respond to a message seeking more details about the reason for the delay. The Navy confirmed the new date and said only that the “program no longer meets our information technology modernization requirements.”

NOAA — the subject of hefty Department of Government Efficiency cuts this year — said Friday the satellite program accounts for a “single dataset in a robust suite of hurricane forecasting and modeling tools” in the National Weather Service’s portfolio.

The agency’s “data sources are fully capable of providing a complete suite of cutting-edge data and models that ensure the gold-standard weather forecasting the American people deserve,” a spokesperson said.

But Union of Concerned Scientists science fellow Marc Alessi told The Associated Press on Friday that detecting the rapid intensification, and more accurately predicting the likely path, of storms is critical as climate change worsens the extreme weather experienced across the globe.