Before Los Angeles disaster, the fire is out of California to others

Christina Welch still remembers what the sky was like the fiery of her Santa Rosa, California’s house 2 miles (3.2 km).

It was the 2017 Tobs fire, the most destructive in California’s history at that time. Mrs. Welch’s neighbor woke her up in the morning and told her to go out with her belongings. When Mrs. Welch opened the door, the ashes were falling from the sky and the smoke was filled with air.

Then, in 2019, Kinque’s fire forced his parents to move for five days.

It was the final push for Mrs. Welch. After a friend’s advice, he packed his belongings and moved to his new city across the country: Duluth, Minnesota.

“It was the final consequence of everything,” said 42 years old. “It has been so many times that if I am going to lose a house, I was going through every fall through anxiety over what’s going to fire.”

Mrs. Welch is one of the few people who have left California in recent years due to extreme weather frequency, even before 28 died this month in the most destructive fire in the history of Los Angeles.

Just this week, a new, fast-moving fire has spread in Los Angeles County in the north-west of the city, which has forced thousands of people to remove a territory in the face of destruction. Trump plans to go to South California on Friday to see the destruction of the fire.

Climate experts say so far they have not seen extensive immigration from the state because of climate -related incidents – and it is difficult to guess how many people have gone. The state’s population growth rate, however, has continued to decline since the US census.

But scientists and population experts say that climate change is becoming more extreme and unexpected due to climate change, so the number of people who leave the state can increase the task of welcoming new cities to new residents.

“The new people here may be the waves that ‘do you know? California is not going to work for me because it is the third time that I had to shut my door because of the extreme glass,’ said Professor Derek Van of Data Science at Michigan University Berkel.

“We need to start preparing for those situations, as they are about to become more frequent and more extreme.”

A number of climate-related reasons may force Californians to leave home in the next decade. Scientists say that the fire is frequent due to climate change. According to Calfire, from 2020 to 2023, the fire in California destroyed more than 15,000 structures. Earlier this year, at least 12,000 structures were destroyed in the fire of Los Angeles.

The state faces climate change as well as other effects including floods. According to the State Attorney General’s Office, the rise in sea level can lead to half a million residents of California in the flood prone area by 2100.

According to the California Department of Conservation, the state also works with at least two earthquakes on an average of 5.5 or more per year.

As the extreme weather becomes more frequent, home insurance rates also increase in the state. According to the San Francisco Chronicle analysis, more than 100,000 residents of California have since lost their home insurance.

Data suggests that climate transfer so far is a local event, some of which are transferred to their own states or even looking for high land in their own city to avoid floods, Jeremy Porter says the main stream of climate effects, which are climate risk Manages modeling.

But, he said, in recent years, a small number of people have begun to jump into outside cities in California that promote themselves as a “climate shelter”.

Climate Adapt Researcher Jesse Kinan This word emerged in the media after publishing research on the departure of people in a handful of cities due to their low risk for extreme climate events, Mr. Kinan called the “receiving zone”.

One of them was Duluth, Minnesota, a former industrial city, where about 90,000 people live, a population that has grown slowly since the year 2020 after the stagnation.

One of the attractions in the city is its closeness to the Great Lake, the lake series, consisting of the world’s largest freshwater part. About 10% of the United States and 30% of Canada depend on the lake for drinking water.

“In a situation where resources have become scarce, this is a wonderful asset,” Mr. Van Berkel says.

Great Lake Water Supply Jamie Beck Alexander and his family were tempted to Duluth. In California, three consecutive, devastating fire season, Mrs Alexander, her husband and two young children stacked in a campaign van and moved to Minnesota across the country in 2020.

Mrs. Alexander has found similarities between small, progressive cities and their old San Francisco city.

“The connection between people has a true depth and deep roots, which I think is important for climate elasticity,” he said.

Mrs. Welch ignored her friends who thought she was crazy to go to a town that is known for her record-breaking and ice conditions, where there is an average sub-fringing temperature on an average of 106 days a year. The crisp on a hill, the beautiful city has become its own, he said.

“There are a lot of people here who love their residence and want to protect it,” Mrs. Welch said about Duluth.

Although some cities have taken their titles as climate shelters, there is a challenge for the smaller local government to find new residents and plans for climate elasticity, Mr. Van Berkel says.

Mr. Van Berkel worked with Duluth and other cities in the Great Lake area on a plan of climate change, including welcoming new residents due to climate change.

Duluth refused to respond to the BBC’s request for comments on how the city is preparing to welcome potential climate immigrants.

At present, Mr. Porter says high levels of immigration are not seen in the Great Lake region and other “climate shelters” cities. But if that changes, many will not be ready, he said.

“Local communities will need a huge investment … the kind of population that those communities will be able to take to indicate some climate immigration literature,” Mr. Porter said.

In the city of Duluth, for example, the availability of housing can be a problem, Mrs Alexander says. He said that although there are new housing places in the city, it does not currently not have enough new development for the growing population. As a result, in years after he left there, he said the price of housing had increased.

And any new housing and other development also need to be kept in mind the climate change, Mr. Van Berkel said.

“We don’t want to make a mistake that can be very expensive with our infrastructure when our climate change is keeping its ugly head,” he said.

In 2024, the Category 4 Hurricane destroyed more than 2,000 homes and businesses of Kelsee Lahr, the climate shelter in Ashaville, Northern Carolina.

He moved there in 2020 after the city’s warm climate, restaurant and music scenes were attracted to the city of Santa Barbara, California, and the city’s warm climate, restaurant and music scene.

Before transferring, Mrs. Lahar studied the most climate-to-the-most-to-the-day residence, where Aashevil’s gentle temperature and internal position are at the top, it protects from the flood.

But last year, Hurricane Helen pushed through West North Carolina, killing more than 100 people in the state and destroying Ashville, the new city of Miss Lahr. Many have been powerless for about 20 days and have been without drinking water for more than a month.

“Obviously southern Appalachia is not the ‘climate shelter’ that was built,” said Mrs. Lahr.

Duluth, Mrs. Alexander said that her family also quickly learned that they could not escape climate change.

During their first summer, the city was hit with the same smoke and bad air quality that had removed them from California – this time from the Canadian fire.

“It was, this is really deep jokes that the universe played on me,” he said. “Unless we (climate change) do not solve the root cause, we will always feel that we need to choose and move.”

Nevertheless, Mrs Alexander does not regret to travel to his family. Mrs. Lahr also does not regret going to Ashaville.

Although Mrs. Lahr often misses the ancient forests of Eosemite National Park in California, where she worked as a park ranger in her summer, she needs to leave for more climate catastrophe in the future, she said.

“I am growingly thinking that the climate shelter is a myth,” he said. “Everyone has to evaluate the risk where they live and leave.”