Against the Fortress
“Climate migration” defies clear definition, but as the impacts of climate change mount and politicians stoke anti-migrant hostility, the climate movement must meet this challenge head-on.
Bearded fireworms cluster in the shallows of the Mediterranean, equipped with parapodia that sense approaching fishing nets. Once sensed, they swarm, puncturing trapped fish through the eyes and gills, devouring them from within. The fireworms thrive in a warming sea, and their numbers have exploded as the Mediterranean heats considerably faster—by a fifth—than the rest of the world’s oceans. This year temperatures again hit record highs.
Each attack is another day wasted for Sicily’s fishing boat crews. If the infestation isn’t controlled, communities dependent on fishing may collapse, and indeed, as Italy is battered by a variety of climate-related impacts, a long march of relocation from rural regions and small towns to urban centres is already underway. This internal movement is not, however, the Mediterranean’s biggest migration issue.
In July of this year, for the fourth time, I sailed into the central Mediterranean aboard the Sicily-based rescue ship Humanity 1, a former environmental research vessel. In one operation we retrieved 45 people who had drifted for five days, exposed to extreme temperatures on the boiling sea. Some were barely conscious as we helped them into the boats. Two years earlier, I’d attended three rescues in similar circumstances, after which our ship was detained under the premise of a bizarre Italian prohibition on conducting multiple rescues in a single excursion, requiring boats to return to port after each rescue even if other ships are in distress.