11 photos that summarize the past 11 months of 2024: What are we doing to the Earth?

The house we live in is too hot, too dangerous.

The reality is that nature is being devastated, and people are paying a heavy price. Every month in 2024 will see floods, wildfires, record heat waves, or some combination of these extreme weather events. Time is running out for world leaders to reach agreement on how to tackle climate change. Some of the planet's most vulnerable communities are finding creative ways to meet these challenges.

This dissonance is jarring.

Inside a stadium in oil-rich Azerbaijan, diplomatic talks aimed at slowing climate change are being stymied by money.

Externally, the burning of fossil fuels has caused incalculable human costs. Millions are suffering. Nature is losing.

Here's a month-by-month look at this year's disasters and how some of the most vulnerable people on the planet are trying to cope in an increasingly untenable world.

January

Temperatures reached 27 degrees Celsius in Washington (USA) on January 26.

The hottest year on record started with the warmest January on record.

February

Ladias Konje, a farmer in a withered corn field in Kanyemba village, Zimbabwe.

A months-long drought has gripped South Africa. Rains failed to arrive in February, when maize, the staple grain, was most needed. Crops died. Livestock died. Some 27 million people, many on the brink of starvation, lacked the food to survive. The cause was a natural weather cycle called El Niño, which occurs when temperatures soar.

March

A green turtle swims through bleached coral at Lizard Island on the Great Barrier Reef, north of Cairns, Australia.

The air and oceans remained as warm as they have been in months. In March, the global average sea surface temperature hit a monthly high of 21.07 degrees Celsius.

It caused a mass bleaching event on Australia's Great Barrier Reef, home to 400 species of coral that support thousands of fish. It was the fourth and largest bleaching event ever recorded.

April

Students in Manila were sweltering in a heat wave so severe that classes had to be canceled.

The world experienced its warmest April on record, the 11th in a string of record-breaking months. A heatwave swept across parts of South and Southeast Asia, with temperatures soaring above 37.7 degrees Celsius for several days. For millions of children, it was too hot to learn. Schools were closed in Bangladesh, India and the Philippines.

May

Fetching water from a well in Shahapur district, Maharashtra state, India.

Dangerous temperatures are gripping parts of India, posing some of the greatest threats to outdoor workers. A new insurance program, created by a union representing informal workers such as fruit vendors and waste pickers, pays a small amount to women who miss days of work because of the heat.

June

Fires along the Paraguay River in the Pantanal, Brazil.

The worst wildfires in two decades in Brazil's Pantanal wetlands have burned more than a million hectares. The culprits: deforestation and drought, exacerbated by climate change. Among the victims: rare jaguars and parrots that inhabit the Pantanal, the world's largest tropical wetland.

July

Damaged and destroyed homes in Petite Martinique, Grenada, following Hurricane Beryl.

Hurricane Beryl hit Caribbean nations including Grenada, Jamaica and St. Vincent and the Grenadines. It also became the first hurricane to trigger an innovative financial solution in Grenada that could bring relief to other hurricane-prone countries: a debt moratorium.

August

A house destroyed in a wildfire in Chalandri, a suburb of Athens.

Europe experienced its hottest August on record to cap off its hottest summer on record. The high temperatures exacerbated drought and the risk of wildfires. A wildfire spread rapidly toward Athens. A nature reserve north of Rome caught fire. Olive trees withered from their branches in southern Italy.

Europe is warming faster than any other continent.

September

Rescue from floods in Maiduguri, Nigeria.

Rich and poor alike have been swamped. In Chad and Nigeria, a region where conflict has forced people from their homes, floods have displaced hundreds of thousands of people and washed away crops.

On the other side of the world, Hurricane Helene has ripped through much of the southern United States like a wrecking ball. Nearly 230 people have died, making it the deadliest storm to hit the continental United States since Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

October

A mud-covered street in the flooded city of Chiva, near Valencia, Spain.

In Valencia, Spain, there was unusually heavy flooding. One town received a year's worth of rain in just eight hours. Valencia recorded 202 deaths. Anger was mounting against provincial officials for not sending out timely evacuation warnings.

November

The sky turns orange in Greenwood Lakes, New York due to wildfires.

New York City has issued a rare drought warning as the northeastern United States grapples with an unusually dry fall. Wildfires have broken out across the region as fall foliage turns to kindling.