In August 2005, as Hurricane Katrina approached New Orleans, a million residents fled. After the levees broke, about 1,000 people died. A month after the hurricane, 600,000 people across the region were still displaced when Hurricane Rita hit, which was responsible for 120 deaths. A year after Katrina, the population of New Orleans was still half its previous size.

This is one of the largest internal displacements the United States has ever seen. It is also a cautionary tale about climate migration. Emergency management organizations had warned for years of the city’s vulnerability to a major hurricane, but New Orleans was unprepared.

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