A man in tattered clothes crawls across rippled sand dunes beneath a large yellow sun. His speech bubble lists water first, then reduced CO2 emissions, green renewable energy and expanded public transportation.

The cartoon by Christopher Weyant appeared June 30, 2021, during a historic heat wave that killed hundreds across the Pacific Northwest. Temperatures in Portland and Seattle broke all-time records by wide margins that week.

Weyant places the figure in an empty desert to show how extreme heat turns familiar places into hostile environments. The trailing list of solutions suggests the man recognizes both immediate relief and longer-term changes are required.

The visual ties personal desperation to policy choices on emissions and infrastructure. Newspapers ran similar images that summer as scientists linked the event to human-driven warming trends.