Transmat World: Human Climate Change Migration Has Already Begun

You may not personally believe that over 97% of climate scientists are in agreement on climate change being real, bad, and caused by humans, but after watching this video of Australian climate scientists planning moves to cooler climes you may want to reconsider. They are reluctant to discuss on camera how bad it is going to get because they don’t want to scare anyone but not in the least reluctant to let their feet do the talking. That seems out of character for supposed money-grubbing, spotlight hugging, government leeches; but what the hell do I know.

Australia is being affected more so than most places by climate change. Heat and drought are continual threats. These climate scientists are planning on moving south into a more temperate zone. That would be Tasmania and New Zealand for Australians. One of them is moving to England. With the temperature reaching 113 degrees F. (historic all-time high) in France on June 29, 2019, he may be reconsidering that decision.

It’s happening all over, not just Australians. It’s New Yorkers buying in the Catskills, and Houstonians buying in Oregon. It’s questions whispered to real estate gurus by bankers and doctors, “Where can I buy a safe piece of property for my son’s/daughter’s future?” It’s Elizabeth Boineaux moving from Charleston, South Carolina because her house had flooded for the third year in a row. It’s Chase Twichell and her husband moving from their retirement apartment in Miami back to New York because the rising water and threat of flooding was getting too scary. It’s Dave Anderson of Houston buying a 70 acre spread in Oregon because of hurricane Harvey. It’s the whole community of Isle de Jean Charles in Louisiana picking up and moving 30 miles inland because their island is being quickly eroded by the rising ocean. A dozen communities in Alaska must move or perish. Properties in such disparate places as Houston and Staten Island are being bought by the government to be razed because they are too risky to live in because of storms and floods.

This migration is already being compared in scale to the Great Migration, the movement of 6 million black Americans from Jim Crow south to northern cities; but climate migration is expected to reach 13 million by the end of the century, 6 million from Florida alone. And that is just based on people fleeing shore-based population centers. It does not include those that seek relief from the heat waves, tornadoes, wildfires, flooding, and tropical disease predicted to affect the rest of the country as a result of climate change.

My wife and I were among the lucky ones during Harvey. We were on an island surrounded by devastation watching friends and family be inundated. It was a feeling of helplessness and insight. These were forces beyond our control, but I could see a way out for the future. As a result of that experience, we will be at the forefront of this “Greatest Migration” that has already begun at the dawn of the Anthropocene.