Africa-Press – Gambia. This Situational Report is being issued for information only, and reflects the current situation and details available at this time.
1. The Situation
The Gambia, like any other country around the globe, continues to face the impacts of climate change. This has led to erratic patterns of rainfall for the past years. 2022 is no exception to this as the rains started earlier than normal. The rains have been predicted to be above normal accompanied by winds.
From 30th to 31st July 2022, heavy rains have been experienced throughout the country. This has led to mass flooding across the country. Some houses have been severely affected that the occupants have to be evacuated to public buildings such as health facilities, mosques and schools for safety. Similarly rains and flooding were realised on 3rd to 5th August 2022 in Upper River Region and Many parts of the country, and this is expected to continue as the rainy season is still left with about 2 months.
The regions that are currently affected are Banjul, Kanifing Municipality, West Coast, North Bank, Lower River Region, and Upper River. In North Bank Region, 4 kids have been reported dead and 1 is in critical condition and under treatment as a result of the thunderstorm that accompanied the rains on 30th July 2022. One (1) other person is also reported dead in the West Coast Region.
According to the Meteorological Department, slight to moderate rain and thunderstorms was expected to prevail over the country during the night of Saturday 30th July. Torrential, moderate to heavy rain and thunderstorms was expected over the country from the early hours of Sunday 31st July, until late in the afternoon which might result to flash flooding over areas prone to flooding. For the 1st August, the wet conditions are expected to prevail over most places in the early hours of the morning particularly the western sector, becoming warm with sunny intervals, with low chances of thunderstorms and rain thereafter. On 2nd August, rains and thunderstorms are expected to prevail over places especially the inland sector from the early parts of the forecast and part of the day. Most of these predictions were realised which led to the current flooding situation.
The Vice President of The Gambia, during his visit to communities affected by the heavy rainfall, disclosed that “the government is working on plans to come up with a resettling scheme for people residing on waterway areas to solve the flooding which people have been grappling with for years around the Greater Banjul Areas” https://thepoint.gm/africa/gambia/headlines/vp- affirms-resettlement-as-flooding-renders-many-homeless
At the time of writing this update, some of the roads that were initially not accessible due to the overflow of rain water are now accessible, although there are still some that are in very bad condition
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