Each summer, the surefire signs of climate change come into sharper focus in the United States. Wildfires and heat waves plague the West. Increasingly intense hurricanes pummel the Southeast. Sudden thunderstorms soak towns from the Midwest to the mountains. Lyme disease-carrying ticks sicken hikers along the East Coast. And melting ice leads to more shipping pollution in Alaska. This barrage of headlines reminds us that these “extreme” events have already become our new normal as a result of the greenhouse gases accumulating in the atmosphere.
Taken one at a time, it’s possible to consume these occasional pieces of disaster coverage and still cling to the idea that climate change is happening somewhere else, to someone else. But listening to the growing chorus of people impacted by the changing climate rising up from all corners of the country forces us to recognize ourselves in our neighbors’ hopes and fears. We have collected six audio stories from people all over the country who are already coping with the devastating consequences from climate change — in their own words.