Diary: Louisiana Underwater

Rosa Lyster visits Louisiana during a climate and environmental degradation crisis – but no one she meets there seems to accept the reality of the situation. After four major weather events – including Hurricane Laura – in less than a year, residents fiercely rebuild to old specs, knowing that another weather event will soon ravage them again. Petrochemical plants Sasol and Citgo play an outsize role in the devastation due to their emissions and habitat destruction, but now, even erosion and weather threaten their infrastructure, too. In this strange, almost mystical hellscape, as Lyster writes in the New Yorker, she no longer wonders why everyone yells, “Be safe!” every time she leaves her motel room.