Frontlines
Each story pairs the science with the human stakes - and an interactive chart of the change underway. Pick a frontline to dive in.
Arctic OceanThe planet’s air conditioner is failing.
The Arctic is warming nearly four times faster than the global average - a phenomenon called Arctic amplification. As bright sea ice gives way to dark open ocean, more sunlight is absorbed, accelerating the melt in a self-reinforcing feedback loop.
−12.2%
Sea-ice loss per decade
Great Barrier Reef, AustraliaA living structure visible from space is turning white.
Corals live in a delicate partnership with algae that give them colour and food. When the ocean overheats, corals expel the algae and turn bone-white. Prolonged bleaching kills them. The Great Barrier Reef has suffered five mass bleaching events since 2016.
7 since 1998
Mass bleaching events
East AfricaFive failed rainy seasons, then catastrophic floods.
Ethiopia, Somalia and Kenya endured the worst drought in 40 years - five consecutive failed rainy seasons - pushing over 20 million people into acute hunger. Then, in late 2023, El Niño-driven rains brought deadly flooding. Whiplash between extremes is the new normal.
23M+
People facing acute food insecurity
Pacific Small Island StatesEntire countries are negotiating their own survival.
For atoll nations like Tuvalu, Kiribati and the Marshall Islands, sea-level rise is an existential threat. Much of their land sits barely a metre or two above the sea. Saltwater contaminates drinking water and crops long before islands fully flood.
~2 m
Average elevation
Amazon Basin, South AmericaThe world’s largest rainforest could become a savanna.
The Amazon stores around 150-200 billion tonnes of carbon and generates much of its own rainfall. Deforestation and drought are pushing it toward a tipping point where large areas could dry out and die back - flipping from a carbon sink to a carbon source.
~17%
Forest already lost
California & the Western U.S.Hotter, drier, and primed to burn.
Climate change has lengthened fire seasons and dried out vegetation across the American West, which is locked in its driest two decades in 1,200 years. Larger, faster, more destructive megafires now threaten communities and blanket the continent in smoke.
driest in 1,200 yrs
Megadrought severity