Alaska’s Climate Crisis Part 2: The Human Cost

In Part One of this series, meteorologist Emily Gracey examined the science behind Alaska’s rapidly changing climate - the warming trends, disappearing sea ice, and extreme storms reshaping the state.

In Part Two, we hear what those changes sound like on the ground.

When the remnants of Typhoon Halong struck Western Alaska in October 2025, more than a thousand people were displaced. Entire villages flooded overnight. In Kwigillingok, Tribal Resilience Coordinator Dustin Evon watched the tide rise at midnight and barely made it to safety. He was one of the lucky ones – entire homes drifted away, many still containing families who weren’t able to leave in time. It was the challenge of a lifetime to see a community disappear.

Now, he faces a new challenge: how to rebuild ...or whether rebuilding

is possible at all.

With no roads connecting rural villages to the rest of Alaska, evacuations must happen by air. And with federal funding fragmented and competitive, long-term relocation can take years…if it happens at all.

This episode explores the human cost of climate change in Alaska, the structural gaps in disaster assistance, and what it means to consider leaving behind the land that your ancestors have occupied for thousands of years.

Because in Western Alaska, resilience isn’t just about surviving the storm.

It’s about deciding whether it’s possible to stay once the storm is over.