> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.possibilities.news/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Over 8,000 Gone in 2024 - URL: https://www.possibilities.news/2024-climate-deaths-8000/ - Published: 2025-01-02T13:00:47.000Z - Updated: 2025-01-02T13:00:47.000Z - Description: Extreme weather events likely fueled by the climate crisis killed at least 8,381 people in 2024, according to my original data analysis. - Author: Yessenia Funes **Today's edition features original data analysis, so it's available only to paid subscribers. Upgrade your subscription** [**here**](https://possibilities-2.ghost.io/ghost/?ref=possibilities.news#/portal/account/plans) **to read in full. Today, I'm writing about the lives we lost in 2024 to severe weather fueled by climate change.** --- **LISTENING:** *to the Mario Party jingle as my friends play* **FEELING:** *excited for a new year* **SEEING:** *my best friend's holiday decor on her table here in Virginia* As the world prepared to ring in the new year last night, much of Puerto Rico sat in the dark. Over 1 million people on the archipelago suffered a [power outage](https://abcnews.go.com/US/puerto-rico-power-new-years-eve/story?id=117235228&ref=possibilities.news). As of New Year's Day (when I'm writing this), most have their power [restored](https://www.axios.com/2025/01/01/puerto-rico-power-blackout-restoration?ref=possibilities.news). It's a shame they lost power to begin with. Since Hurricane Maria, the region has suffered from regular blackouts. The electrical grid was already weak prior to the killer storm, but Maria dealt the deadly blow. Energy company LUMA took over the grid in 2021\. Puerto Ricans have been unhappy with the service, and even New York Attorney General Letitia James [called](https://ag.ny.gov/press-release/2022/attorney-general-james-calls-investigation-puerto-rico-energy-provider?ref=possibilities.news) for a federal investigation back in 2022. As we welcome a new year, I hope we all take a moment of gratitude for the comfort and privilege many of us experience. Hurricane Maria [killed](https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/research/2018/09/puerto-rico-a-year-after-hurricane-maria/?ref=possibilities.news#:~:text=On%2028%20August%202018%2C%20Puerto,Trump%20has%20denied%20the%20numbers.) nearly 3,000 people. Every year, people are dying at the hands of manmade climate change. I've made it a goal to document those deaths every week in my Rest in Power section. Then, I take those numbers and crunch them for my annual retrospective to offer an estimate of how many people have died in the last year. In 2024, at least 8,381 people died due to extreme weather events, likely made worse through the fossil fuel pollution our leaders allow companies to pollute. The number comes from what I gather every week. It's likely an underestimate because death tolls usually rise in the weeks (or even months or years) after an event. Look at Hurricane Maria, for instance. The initial death toll was just 64\. Two years later, the governor increased the official death toll to 2,975, a dramatic rise. I don't track each disaster to share the most recent numbers in this end-of-year analysis. I'm hoping I can start doing that in 2025 by building a more robust database that I'll update weekly. I saw the highest numbers the week of May 30, 2024, when a landslide struck several villages in the Lagaip-Porgera District of Papua New Guinea toward the west. The government still hasn't announced a final death toll, [per an October 2024 report](https://reliefweb.int/report/papua-new-guinea/papua-new-guinea-landslide-2024-dref-operational-update-mdrpg012?ref=possibilities.news), but 670 were estimated dead at the time of the landslide. Nearly 8,000 people were affected by the event. I've seen the aftermath of a landslide firsthand when I [traveled to Malawi](https://www.vox.com/climate/2023/12/12/23997274/cop28-malawi-climate-reparations-loss-and-damage?ref=possibilities.news) to report on the impacts of Cyclone Freddy. It's awful. Mud and rocks cause damage that's hard to clean up. When you see the remnants of such devastation every day, it's also heavy on a community's mental health. I know that it can also be a lot for all of us to carry — to bear witness to such loss of life. As I look at the numbers [I gathered from 2023](https://www.possibilities.news/2023-climate-change-deaths/), I recognize that 2024 could've been a lot worse. In 2023, I only gathered data from June to December (Possibilities wasn't around before June 2023). However, those six months still had nearly 30 percent more deaths than all of 2024\. That's because we had the [Libya floods](https://reliefweb.int/report/libya/libya-floods-emergency-six-month-impact-report-september-2023-march-2024?ref=possibilities.news) in 2023, where over 4,000 people died. I hope 2025 is full of more life. We can't stop the weather, but we can be better prepared. We can build infrastructure that does a better job of keeping people safe. We can improve our emergency alert systems. We can connect more communities to the internet (for free if our governments really cared) so they can keep themselves informed. We can check in on the elderly and [build resilience centers](https://nextcity.org/urbanist-news/ira-tax-credits-black-atlanta-church-solar-power-emergency-hub?ref=possibilities.news) for people to refrigerate their medicines and plug in their life-saving devices when the power goes out. We can pay people a living wage so that they can afford to evacuate and rent a hotel when a storm is headed their way. President-elect Donald Trump will make all those options a lot harder. He'll likely kill federal funding for cities or states that want to invest in their communities. Let us not forget he was president when Hurricane Maria descended on Puerto Rico. Who will he abandon this term? We cannot allow him to leave the most vulnerable for dead. He answers to the people. He answers to us. 🌀 ## Rest in Power **While we can't say for certain that climate change led to these specific weather events (we need attribution studies for that), we do know that the Earth's rising temperatures are already creating more disasters like these.** Tornadoes have been swirling through the South. At least 34 were reported in Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Alabama. [In Texas](https://abcnews.go.com/US/severe-weather-including-risk-tornadoes-impact-south-weekend/story?id=117164376&ref=possibilities.news), at least two people have died from the storms. ## Currently Reading I've been reading absolutely nothing except "Elsewhere" by Gabrielle Zevin. Sorry! Hope you've all been reading some delicious literature, too. Except — I just found [this](https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/29/us/hurricane-helene-craigtown-north-carolina-deaths.html?ref=possibilities.news) story from Eduardo Melina at The New York Times in doing my research for the above section. Wow. Please read it. Hurricane Helene wiped out 11 members of this one family in a North Carolina town they made their own. ## Poetry ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/0c/1a/0c1a1c44-c395-4236-a843-5697585f81d1/content/images/2025/01/471833043_582074247766775_5864371317832805863_n.jpg) "Good Bones" by Maggie Smith, which I found via the Read a Little Poetry [Instagram page.](https://www.instagram.com/readalittlepoem/?ref=possibilities.news) ****What are you reading and seeing? Share in a comment.** **Happy New Year, everyone! My big resolution for this year is to start reporting and writing a memoir I've been thinking about for a while.** \- Yessenia xx