Storms over Teignmouth Pier: Climate, Community and Mourning the Future
- valeriehuggins0
- Apr 13
- 4 min read
Updated: 7 days ago
I have lived in the same part of the world, Devon in the south west of England, for all of my life. I am rooted into this place and its familiarity is comforting and shelters me in these tumultuous times. This little corner of Devon has always felt like a safe haven. And yet I am feeling increasingly 'unmoored'.
Reading 'Nation of Strangers' by Ece Temelkuran is helping me to make sense of this disequilibrium. A profound and thought-provoking book, written as a series of letters from Ece - an exile from her home country of Turkey - to us the readers. Through these letters she charts her experience of being 'unhomed', responding to four key questions: Who are you? Why did I leave? How will I survive here? When will you return home?
I have not - at least not yet - lost my home through war, climate change and rising fascism in the way that so many people across the world have and are doing as I write. But I am beginning to feel something similar: a sense that the ground beneath me is shifting. I feel 'unhomed' politically, morally and spiritually. The certainties that have kept me upright for most of my life feel as though they are disintegrating. And it is frightening.
Ece argues that we are currently "mourning in future tense" - grieving in advance for the loss of both our environment to climate crisis and our democracies to the rise of authoritarianism.
For me, that feeling has come to be symbolised by the pier at Teignmouth, a place I have visited since early childhood. Built in 1867 it has long been a part of the landscape of my life. On the 24th January 2026, the wind and waves of Storm Ingrid destroyed the end section of the pier. The damage triggered a collective outpouring of sadness from the local communities who treasure it, alongside anger that it had been left unrepaired from previous storms over many decades.
The day before the storm arrived I stood on the seafront. The sea was already in a frenzy, the ground vibrating with each wave that slammed into the seawall. I was soaking wet and cold, yet there was also a feeling of exhilaration in witnessing the sheer wildness of of it all. Above the surf, the gulls swooped and veered over the cresting waves, playing a game of brinkmanship.
When I returned just after the storm, the damage to the pier was stark. Standing there, amongst the crowd of other shocked onlookers, I thought of Temelkuran's quesion: What have we lost?
The broken pier suddenly felt symbolic of something much larger - a sense of environmental and political collapse. I found myself close to tears as I stood in that familiar place looking at the destruction. The pier is privately owned, run for profit. It is uninsurable. Like so many of our shared assets it no longer belongs to the communities who love it. And yet those who profit from it have failed to adapt it to withstand the realities of a changing climate.
Later, photographs appeared on social media sites showing fragments of the pier washed up further along the coast and I saw for myself the erosion of the sand leaving beach huts undermined:
That sight deepened my anger, not just about the pier, but about a political system that has allowed so much of our once common wealth to be privatised and exploited. Water, energy, transport, green spaces, housing - resources that once belonged to all of us, sold off for the short-term benefit of the few, with profit placed above environmental protection. At the same time, the political protections many of us believed in for decades feel increasingly fragile. What once seemed unthinkable is becoming normal. The climate system is destablising faster than our politics can respond. Many are turning to authoritarian solutions because democracy has failed to deliver the equality it promised. Temelkuran suggests that in this moment we cannot restore the old order.
The home we long for may no longer exist, instead we must build a new political and moral home together with generosity, humility, compassion and kindness. The 'strangers' in our country now are the experts on how to stay humane in this world, how to be self-sufficient in the face of climate crisis.
As Ece reminds us: "This is the first time in human history that we are mourning in the future tense", losing our democracy and our planet. What I long for is in the past. There is no going back. Our future depends on the kindness we show each other along the way.
Listen to the words of Ece Temelkuran as she talks about Nation of Strangers with Krishnan Guru-Murthy C4 Podcast
NB The image of the pieces of the pier washed up at Holcombe is not one that I took. It was posted uncredited on Facebook.
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