The livid light of late October illuminates Shishmaref Inlet, located just 21 miles (34 kilometers) south of the Arctic Circle. The Inuit living in the village of Shishmaref may soon be the first refugees of global warming. Rising sea levels and the melting of permafrost are causing their island to quickly erode into the Chukchi Sea.

(Text adapted from and photograph shot on assignment for, but not published in, the National Geographic book Alaska, 1969)