Have you ever wondered what the world would be like if everyone suddenly disappeared?
If humans disappeared from the world, and you could come back to Earth to see what had happened one year later, the first thing you’d notice wouldn’t be with your eyes… it would be with your ears. The world would be quiet. And you would realise how much noise people make. Our buildings are noisy. Our cars are noisy. Our sky is noisy. All of that noise would stop. After a year without people, the sky would be bluer, the air clearer. The wind and the rain would scrub clean the surface of Earth; all the smog and dust that humans make would be gone.
Imagine that first year, when your house would sit unbothered. Inside your house, no water would be in your faucets. Water systems require constant pumping. If no one’s at the water supply to manage the machines that pump water, then there’s no water. But the water that was in the pipes when everyone disappeared would still be there when the first winter came. On the first cold snap, the frigid air would freeze the water in the pipes and burst them. There would be no electricity. Power plants would stop working because no one would monitor them and maintain a supply of fuel. Your house would be dark, with no lights, TV, phone or computer. Your house would be dusty. There’s dust in the air all the time, but we don’t notice it because our air-conditioning systems and heaters blow air around. As you move through the rooms in your house, you keep dust on the move too. But once all that stops, the air inside your house would be still and the dust would settle all over.
The grass in your garden would grow until it got so long and floppy it would stop growing. New weeds would appear, and they would be everywhere. Lots of plants that you’ve never seen before would take root. Every time a tree drops a seed, a little sapling might grow. No one would be there to pull it out or cut it down. You’d notice a lot more bugs buzzing around. People tend to do everything they can to get rid of bugs: they spray the air and the ground with bug spray, remove habitats, put screens on windows. And if that doesn’t work, they swat them. Without people doing all these things, the bugs would come back. They would have free rein of the world again. Critters would wander around. First the little ones: mice, groundhogs, raccoons, skunks, foxes and beavers. Bigger animals would come later – deer, wolves and the occasional bear. Maybe not in the first year, but eventually.
With no electric lights, the rhythm of the natural world would return. The only light would be from the Sun, the Moon and the stars. The night critters would feel good they got their dark sky back. Fires would happen frequently. Lightning might strike a tree or a field and set bru
