Off the Radar

In Part One of this series, meteorologist Emily Gracey examined the science behind Alaska’s rapidly changing climate - the warming trends, disappearing sea ice, and extreme storms reshaping the state.

In Part Two, we hear what those changes sound like on the ground.

When the remnants of Typhoon Halong struck Western Alaska in October 2025, more than a thousand people were displaced. Entire villages flooded overnight. In Kwigillingok, Tribal Resilience Coordinator Dustin Evon watched the tide rise at midnight and barely made it to safety. He was one of the lucky ones – entire homes drifted away, many still containing families who weren’t able to leave in time. It was the challenge of a lifetime to see a community disappear.

Now, he faces a new challenge: how to rebuild ...or whether rebuilding
is possible at all.

With no roads connecting rural villages to the rest of Alaska, evacuations must happen by air. And with federal funding fragmented and competitive, long-term relocation can take years…if it happens at all.

This episode explores the human cost of climate change in Alaska, the structural gaps in disaster assistance, and what it means to consider leaving behind the land that your ancestors have occupied for thousands of years.

Because in Western Alaska, resilience isn’t just about surviving the storm.

It’s about deciding whether it’s possible to stay once the storm is over.

Behind every chatbot response, AI-generated image, and large language model is a vast network of data centers consuming enormous amounts of electricity and water. In this episode, Emily talks with Dr. Amanda Smith of Project Drawdown about the hidden environmental footprint of generative AI and what it means for a warming, resource-constrained world.

Dr. Smith explains how data centers operate, why they are often located where power is cheap and reliable, and why water remains the most efficient way to cool the servers that power today’s AI systems. We unpack the difference between carbon footprints and water footprints, explore why training AI models is especially energy intensive, and clarify common misconceptions about how much water tools like ChatGPT actually use.

The key question is not whether we should use AI, but how we use it. Thoughtful deployment, smarter infrastructure, and informed users will shape whether generative AI becomes part of the climate problem or part of the solution.

For more than a century, the Winter Olympics have depended on cold, reliable conditions. But as the planet warms, that foundation is becoming harder to find.

As the Games return to Northern Italy, this episode of Off the Radar examines how climate change is reshaping the future of winter sports. Meteorologist Emily Gracey speaks with Dr. Daniel Scott of the University of Waterloo, whose research shows a rapidly shrinking list of cities capable of hosting the Winter Olympics safely and fairly.

We explore why warmer temperatures mean more than just artificial snow, how deteriorating snow and ice increase risks for athletes, and why the Paralympic Games face even steeper challenges as competition moves deeper into warmer months.

With fewer cold places left on the map, the question is no longer theoretical. Can the Winter Olympics survive in a warming climate, and what decisions made today will determine their future?

The future of weather forecasting is being built right now.

Recorded on site at the annual meeting of the American Meteorological Society in Houston, this conversation with Ken Graham, Director of the National Weather Service, looks at where meteorology has been, where it is headed, and what it will take to get there.

This year’s conference theme, “Fast and Slow Thinking: the Human Factor in a Rapidly Changing World,” took on added meaning as a major winter storm disrupted travel and kept some participants away. But it did not slow the collaboration, innovation, and urgency inside the meeting rooms.

Ken Graham shares how artificial intelligence is transforming weather models, why partnerships across the weather enterprise matter more than ever, and how modern communication, from weather radios to social media, plays a critical role when it matters most. He also talks about the energy he sees across the National Weather Service, the next wave of talent coming in, and why he is genuinely excited about the year ahead. It is a conversation about technology, trust, and turning forecasts into action.

Climate science is most often communicated through charts, graphs, and visual models. But data does not have to be seen to be understood.

In this episode, meteorologist Emily Gracey explores how climate data can be translated into sound. Emily is joined by mathematician and musician Harlan Brothers, who creates climate sonifications by converting real datasets into music and audio you can hear.

Using measurements such as global temperature over land, sea surface temperatures, and sea level rise, Harlan turns long term warming trends into melodies that reveal patterns over time. The conversation looks at how sonification works, why sound can engage people differently than visuals, and how music can add a new dimension to climate communication without compromising scientific integrity.

Throughout the episode, listeners will hear examples of these climate sonifications woven into the discussion, offering a chance to experience climate data through a different sense.