Last Week in Collapse: June 8-14, 2025
Protests, AMOC studies, water scarcity, displacement, marine heat waves, and escalation in the larger Middle East. I think this episode is a rerun.
Last Week in Collapse: June 8-14, 2025
This is Last Week in Collapse, a weekly newsletter compiling some of the most important, timely, useful, soul-crushing, ironic, amazing, or otherwise must-see/can’t-look-away moments in Collapse.
This is the 181st weekly newsletter. You can find the June 1-7, 2025 edition here on Reddit if you missed it last week. Thank you all for subscribing to the Substack.
——————————
50+ heads of state gathered in the French Riviera last week for a big UN Ocean Conference. The oceans absorb 90% of annual anthropogenic heat—some 370+ zettajoules in the last 70 years. One zettajoule is equivalent to 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 joules if you’re counting. A proposed international treaty to regulate international waters is lacking a few more states before it can enter into force, following 18 more state ratifications last week. It will be the first treaty to focus on protecting biodiversity in the high seas.
A study in Global Change Biology found that our oceans have potentially already tipped into acidification, and crossed this planetary boundary. They claim that “up to 60% of the global subsurface ocean (down to 200 m) had crossed that {planetary} boundary, compared to over 40% of the global surface ocean.” The study examined concentrations of the mineral aragonite, which many marine animals rely on for growing shells & bones—and which is less present as the acidity of ocean water increases.
Canada’s prairie wildfires have entered Ontario. The blazes have now forced 30,000 from their homes since they began about a month ago. Air evacuations have evacuated thousands. Flooding in South Africa killed 49+ people. Meanwhile, an analysis of Greenland’s melt during 15-21 May 2025 during a record temperature heat wave (14.3 °C or 58 °F) found that the ice sheet melted 17x as much compared to normal mid-May.
As India slowly cooks, demand for air conditioners is soaring among its rising middle class. The necessary relief requires an externalized cost: the development of electricity (45% of the country’s power is coal-generated ) which further pollutes the air. 7 of the 10 worst cities for air pollution are in India.
A study in Environmental Research Letters claims there is a link between the AMOC and the southern Amazon rainforest. “Large-scale nonlinear and possibly irreversible changes in system state, such as AMOC weakening or rainforest-savanna transitions in the Amazon basin, would have severe impacts on ecosystems and human societies worldwide,” says the study’s abstract. As the AMOC weakens, precipitation in the southern Amazon increases, offsetting long-term trends of Drought and ecological Collapse: “a 4.8% increase of mean dry season precipitation in the Southern AR for every 1 Sv of AMOC weakening.” Sv refers to the rate of flow within an ocean current—and the AMOC, currently measuring about 17 Sv, is weakening at about 0.8 Sv per decade. The scientists conclude that “other critical drivers of AR stability, such as global warming and deforestation, have destabilising effects that the interaction from the AMOC cannot fully compensate for.”
Relatedly, a Canadian PhD released an AMOC simulator/model last week. This experimental website allows you to visualize earth under 2 and 4 °C warming futures, simulate extreme warmth events, see sea-ice projections, and several other climate factors.
An editorial in Frontiers in Water is warning about a range of “emerging contaminants” like pesticides, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, and other “chemicals and pollutants not removed or eliminated by traditional water treatment processes.” Many of these compounds are not treated with traditional water treatment practices, and are increasing in concentration. They pose a range of health consequences impacting hormones, immune system, and healthy neurological development…
“Global water usage is projected to rise by 55% from 2000 to 2050….freshwater sources are threatened due to climate change, population growth, and urbanization….Around half of the population globally experiences water shortage for at least part of the year. Water deficits were linked to a 10% increase in global migration between 1970–2000…..In lower-income countries, poor water quality is due to low levels of wastewater treatment, which differ from higher-income countries, whereas runoff from agriculture poses the most serious problem….Emerging contaminants may also have low acute toxicity but cause significant reproductive effects at extremely low exposure levels….by 2050, water-related problems will shave about 8% off global GDP, with developing countries facing a 15% loss….” -excerpts from the brief editorial
“Under a medium-high emission scenario, many regions worldwide transition from chiefly experiencing a given category of hazard or impact in isolation to routinely experiencing compound hazard or impact occurrences.” So says a study published this June in Earth’s Future. The categories of disasters expected to converge and devastate regions are “river floods, droughts, heatwaves, wildfires, tropical cyclone-induced winds and crop failures.” A number of useful map graphics help visualize the danger for each hazard. The co-occurrence of heat waves and wildfires are, by far, the most common paired disasters analyzed here. Drought & heat waves rank a distant second place.
Part of Algeria set a new June record at 42.6 °C (109 °F). Zimbabwe is planning to cull 50 elephants in an attempt to manage the population. Heat wave in the U.S. Pacific Northwest. New research indicates that “combustion in {the} manufacturing {construction} industry” produces more than 5x more of central London’s black carbon (BC) air pollution than automobiles. “BC is second only to greenhouse gases (GHGs) in radiative forcing and warming of the atmosphere via the direct absorption of solar radiation.”
Scientists are calling them “super marine heat waves” and they are becoming much more common across our oceans. These underwater heat waves, which can (in extreme cases) last longer than a year, can cause dieoff and extinction of aquatic flora & fauna, driving migration of other marine species. Many lifeforms, like coral, are too slow to escape ocean warming. Some oceanographers believe that some regions of the world may enter a period of permanent heat wave as our waters warm in future decades.
A negative Indian Ocean Dipole is thought to be developing later in 2025, bringing increased precipitation to Oceania and drier-than-average conditions to East Africa. A number of central China stations broke June temperature records with temperatures, in some places, over 38 °C (100 °F). In England, some 78,000 saplings have been laid low by Drought before they could establish themselves in the ecosystem. Drought is one of the major reasons behind the end of carbon-sink forests across Europe.
Hong Kong set a new June record temperature, very close to its all-time record. Parts of Siberia allegedly had minimum temperatures of 25 °C (77 °F) last week. Senegal also had record temperatures for this time of the year, at almost 47 °C (116 °F). A batch of world maps and U.S.-specific maps—made as part of a study in Nature Communications—illustrates a range of areas best-positioned for reforestation efforts across earth.
Following wide-scale termination of government employees, www.climate.gov, a U.S. website sharing educational materials on climate science, is being shut down. Some fear its content will be replaced by climate denial or other disinformation. President Trump is also planning on disbanding FEMA towards the end of the year, and thereafter disbursing emergency relief funds through his own office in the future. And the U.S. EPA “proposed to repeal all “greenhouse gas” emissions standards” for fossil fuel power plants…
Fairbanks (pop: 32,000), Alaska issued its first ever heat warning when temperatures hit 86 °C (30 °C) on Thursday. NOAA forecasts an average size “dead zone” this year in the Gulf of Mexico/America, about 25% larger than Jamaica. “The dead zone, or hypoxic zone, is an area of low oxygen that can kill fish and other marine life. It occurs every summer and is primarily a result of excess nutrient pollution from human activities in cities and farm areas throughout the Mississippi-Atchafalaya watershed.”
Ahead of COPout30 in Brazil, the country is auctioning off massive tracts of land for oil & gas exploration, equivalent combined to the size of two Sri Lankas, or two Hispaniloas.
——————————
A top U.S. official removed all 17 members from a committee that provides official vaccine recommendations, theoretically to install a slate of pro-Trump doctors instead. Canada’s measles emergency worsens with more cases in Manitoba and Ontario. Arizona reported its first measles case this year—four cases, actually.
Some sources claim that recovering mentally from COVID symptoms takes 3x as long as the physical symptoms. Other research examined Long COVID in children aged 0-5 years old, and found that about 15% of babies had developed Long COVID symptoms; for them, the most common manifestations were low appetites, sleep trouble, coughing, and stuffy nose. Long COVID is also being blamed for rising workplace absenteeism.
With rising electricity demand (about 4% increase annually worldwide), some observers believe future blackouts are inevitable collateral damage from future climate emergencies. In Cuba, daily power outages last 18 hours. Nor is it always climate-caused; Israel recently cut off Gaza’s final cable to the Internet, and Russian strikes in Chernihiv caused a temporary blackout. South Africa has had a temporary reprieve from load-shedding but sources warn that it could begin again any day… Kerala state in India introduced load-shedding for four hours one night last week.
The director of the WHO repeated last week that mpox remains a global health emergency. Sierra Leone reported 15 deaths and 3,000+ cases in May. In Sudan, cholera cases reportedly increased by 1,350+ on Wednesday alone.
Despite Trump’s passion for fossil fuels, U.S. oil output is projected to fall in 2026 from its 2025 highs. Others are concerned about crises linked not just to oil but to food as well, “because the number of people on Earth increases every day, while the amount of land on Earth does not….the planet can’t keep losing a soccer field’s worth of tropical forest every six seconds” to feed modern appetites.
Another round of US-China trade negotiations happened last week, supposedly with the result that China will increase exports of rare earths to the U.S. for six months. Economists say that any momentary gain for the United States through its trade talks comes at the expense of huge reputational loss, dwindling faith in the U.S. economy & leadership, and loss of future growth. The U.S. bond market has dropped to 50+ year lows. Despite courts challenging the legality of Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs, courts determined that they could remain in place during judicial challenges.
A large spending bill moving through the U.S. government is expected to worsen the country’s debt situation, and perhaps increase stagflation and Fed rates. This would in turn increase borrowing rates for U.S. mortgages and other loans. Britain’s national debt meanwhile is hovering at around 100% of its GDP, while the cost of debt servicing is climbing to new highs every year. The World Bank predicts the lowest global economic growth for 2025 in 50+ years, with just 2.3%.
Turkmenistan’s antiquated water infrastructure, coupled by agriculture’s strong demand on water, has left the country facing a growing water crisis. A recent canal dug in Afghanistan has also diverted precious water from the nation, which also relies on water for part of its massive natural gas industry. A series of compound crises—three cyclones, rising violence by Islamists, massive cuts to food aid, and displacement—have crippled Mozambique’s food security situation, and security in general.
——————————
A school shooter in Austria killed ten before himself. A plane crash in a residential part of Ahmedabad, India killed all but one of the 242 people onboard, plus 35+ victims on the ground. A man mounted an assassination of a U.S. state lawmaker and her husband, injured another, and reportedly planned to target scores of other Democrat lawmakers.
The UNHCR released a 64-page report last week on forced displacement (both internal & external). The document claims that the total number of displaced people rose by 2.1M from April 2024 to April 2025, although the number of refugees dropped slightly for the first time in 14 years. About 73.5M people are currently internally displaced. Eastern Libya’s ruler, Khalifa Haftar, has reportedly coordinated attacks with rebel Sudanese forces against Sudan’s government army at several locations along the border—the first time Libya has directly mobilized soldiers against Sudan during this War.
“At end-2024, 7.4 million Congolese were forcibly displaced....the number of people displaced within the country {Haiti} tripled during the year, from 313,900 to over 1 million….more than 5 million Ukrainian refugees were reported at end-2024….An estimated 4.4 million stateless people were reported globally at the end of 2024….The war in Sudan triggered the world’s largest displacement crisis with a total of 14.3 million Sudanese remaining displaced at the end of 2024….Widespread floods in 2024 affected over 1.5 million people in Niger and 733,000 in Mali, destroying homes and infrastructure…” -excerpts from the report
Iran banned dog-walking in public across a number of cities. India’s suspension of the Indus Waters Treaty, plus ongoing Drought, has reduced Pakistan’s supply of water ahead of the monsoon season, expected to arrive in Pakistan in a couple weeks. President Trump’s controversial rally at Fort Bragg pushed the envelope with philippics against his political foes, soliciting open boos and jeers from soldiers.
A dark report from Darfur shares frontline stories of loss, War, disease, slavery, indiscriminate shelling, starvation, displacement, large-scale victimization, and the complete Collapse of society. Recent attacks on aid workers in Darfur killed 5, and also burned several trucks full of supplies.
Violent looting at a hospital in Ulang, South Sudan (county pop: 200,000?) forced its closure, and the termination of support for 13 other health centers. According to one aid official, “They took everything: medical equipment, laptops, patients’ beds and mattresses from the wards, and approximately nine months' worth of medical supplies, including two planeloads of surgical kits and drugs delivered just the week before….Whatever they could not carry, they destroyed.”
“Our sovereignty is in question,” said a local criminologist, after police discovered a large cache of firearms and ammunition in Jamaica. In Colombia, a series of coordinated bombings and shootings across Cali (pop: 2.9M) and its suburbs killed 7 and injured dozens more. A two-day operation against Haitian gangsters allegedly killed 100+ fighters using drones to target gang strongholds, presaging the future of civil conflict more generally.
Wide-ranging strikes in Kyiv and Odesa killed four and two, respectively; strikes in Kharkiv killed three and injured 60+ others. German intelligence suggests that Russia is planning some kind of attack to test if NATO will invoke Article 5, the key treaty provision guaranteeing collective defense among its members. Intelligence suggests that on Thursday Russia suffered its one millionth casualty last week. The number of Cubans recruited/trafficked into the Russian army has now totaled 20,000, according to some estimates; 1,000 more are said to have come in March-May.
A major NGO claims that, over the last two months, Algeria deported 7,000+ migrants over the border to Niger, stranded in the middle of the Sahara. Accounts of people dying from dehydration and exhaustion—as well as various forms of abuse—have been reported at the swelling refugee camps.
President Trump sent 700 Marines to LA (LA County pop: 9.7M) alongside thousands of National Guardsmen and police in order to intimidate (or provoke) protestors and back up his mass deportation efforts. Morale is reportedly “not great” among those deployed. “Democracy is under assault,” said 2028 Democratic frontrunner & California governor Gavin Newsom. The mayor of Los Angeles imposed a 10-hour curfew on downtown LA, political friction is growing, and a large web of protests have emerged across all fifty states. “If there's an insurrection, I would certainly invoke it {the Insurrection Act},” wrote Trump, foreshadowing what many have come to believe is an inevitable push for more executive authority.
The Madleen yacht ferrying supplies—and Greta Thunberg—to Gaza was intercepted and its sailors apprehended by Israeli forces. Another armed conflict in Gaza—between Hamas and an anti-Hamas militia armed by Israel—is developing, and threatens to expand into a civil war inside a land already devastated by 18 months of intense War. Wednesday saw 60 more Palestinians killed, including two mass shootings at food hubs which slew 25 and 14. Many more were wounded. Gaza authorities claim 55,000+ people have been killed since 7 October.
Following a determination by the International Atomic Energy Agency that Iran was in breach of its nuclear obligations, the IDF launched an attack, “Operation Rising Lion,” which killed a number of high-ranking military officials, nuclear scientists, and targeted key nuclear, oil, and military sites. Iran responded with 100+ drones which were mostly intercepted by Israel, but a new wave of attacks on Saturday night killed 10 and injured scores in Israel. Iran also announced a new nuclear enrichment site. Trump is trying to leverage the moment to push a new nuclear deal on Iran. Days before the strike, Houthi forces in Yemen promised that “escalation against the Islamic Republic of Iran is also dangerous and will drag the entire region into the abyss of war.”
——————————
Select comments/threads from the subreddit last week suggest:
-Our planet is rocketing towards 2 °C faster than expected—by 2037, or perhaps earlier. This thread, citing a number of renowned climate scientists. 2.5 °C before 2050, 3 °C by the early 2060s…This civilization is cooked. As one deceased professor once put it, “The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function.”
-COVID is still around us, and it is dangerous. This long weekly observation summarizes some of the latest developments in COVID which I neglected to include in their entirety in this week’s edition. The poster also remarks upon extreme weather, glitches in society, the breakdown of support systems, unrest, and more. Their burnout is palpable.
Got any feedback, questions, comments, upvotes, sunscreen advice, locust recipes, ceasefire thoughts, geoengineering schemes, bunker blueprints, etc.? Click here if you want to read the Reddit comments on this edition. As always, thank you for your support. What did I miss this week?
Thank you for all of your efforts/work. You/we are NOT ALONE! Have a blessed day!