In 2024, a glacial lake outburst flood, or GLOF, in Thame, Nepal, and Hurricane Helene in western North Carolina caused massive landslides and flooding, displacing residents and devastating communities. In both disasters, survivors were left with the harsh reality of lost land.

Winner of the 2025 Raoul Wallenberg Fellowship at the University of Michigan, Stephanie Smith has closely followed these devastations and is committed to finding solutions to better address them. For her, the striking parallels between these crises underscore the growing severity of climate change, exposing vulnerabilities in both global and U.S. disaster response efforts.

Learn more at Michigan News