At least thirteen deaths amid flooding in Accra, Ghana.

At least thirteen people have died and a further seven are missing following flooding in the Ghanaian capitol, Accra, following a heavy rainstorm overnight between Sunday 28 and Monday 29 June 2026, with over 38 800 people from more than 7750 households displaced by floodwaters. The worst affected areas of the city is Ga East, where five people are known to have died, and another 2000 people have been displaced from their homes, and Ayawaso Central three people have died and one is missing, while about 3020 people have been displaced. Another three people have died in Tema West, where about 3450 have been displaced. In Ledzokuku one person has died and around 1200 have been displaced by the flooding. 

In Ga Central over 1800 people have been displaced, but there are no reports of any fatalities of missing persons, while in Ga West about 2300 people have been displaced, again with no reports of fatalities or missing persons. About 1850 people have been displaced from their homes in Adentan, while about 6500 have been displaced from  Korle Klottey. About 2620 people have been displaced by flooding in Okaikwei North, while in Okaikwei South the figure is about 3450 people. In Tema Metropolis about 3600 people were displaced, but no casualties have been reported. About 2200 people have been displaced by flooding in La Dadekotopon, and about 1100 in Krowor.

Officials from the Ghanaian National Disaster Management Organisation and soldiers from the 48 Engineer Regiment of the Ghana Armed Forces rescue people trapped by floodwaters in Accra, Ghana. National Disaster Management Organisation.

Outside of Accra, twenty houses are reported to have collapsed due to flooding in the Cape Coast Metropolis, with five people killed inside one of these buildings when it collapsed, and a sixth person drowning in a separate incident. Two people were killed in another building collapse in Mfantsiman, with another person drowning separately, and in Gomoa Central one person was killed in a building collapse and another drowned. Altogether, 58 houses are reported to have been destroyed in Central Region, with flooding also reported in the Volta and Western North regions.

June falls in the middle of the rainy season in Accra, with the city receiving an average of 175 mm of rain during the month. West Africa has a distinct two season climatic cycle, with a cool dry season during the northern winter when prevalent winds blow from the Sahara to the northeast, and a warm rainy season during the northern summer when prevalent winds blow from the Atlantic Ocean to the southwest. These warm winds from the Atlantic are laden with moisture, which can be lost rapidly when the air encounters cooler conditions.

Rainfall and prevalent winds during the West African dry and rainy seasons. Encyclopedia Britanica.

However, this year's rains have been far heavier than usual, with 169.2 mm of rain falling in 24 hours on Sunday 28 March, the fourth highest level of rainfall in a single day ever recorded in Ghana, and 593.2 mm of rain falling in June, the wettest month ever recorded in the city. The previous record-holding year was 2002, when 420.6 mm of rain fell in Accra during June, a figure which this year has exceeded by more than the average rainfall for the month. These rising rain levels are linked to greater sea surface temperatures over the Atlantic Ocean as the global climate warms, which leads to greater levels of evaporation from the sea, followed by increased precipitation on land.

Nevertheless, the high rainfall levels are not thought to be the main cause of the flooding which Accra has been suffering this week. Instead, local authorities are blaming the city's lax building controls, which have led to buildings and settlements spreading over and covering up drainage systems, as well as covering areas that were formally open soil with concrete, preventing water from soaking away. This has led to orders fir several illegally built properties to be demolished in the wake of the floods, though local community groups are asking for more consultation before any such plans are implemented, as in the past authorities have demolished properties without any plan to resettle their occupants, resulting in the rebuilding of properties once the authorities have left.

See also...

Three dead and two missing following flash flood in Arunachal Pradesh.

Three people have been confirmed dead and another two are missing following a flash flood in the Keyi Panyor District of Arunachal Pradesh State, India, on Wednesday 24 June 2026. A further 54 families have been displaced by the incident, in which waters from the Rangandani River Dam Lake over-topped a wall surrounding a residential camp for employees of the North Eastern Electric Power Corporation working on the Panyor Lower Hydroelectric Project (also known as the Rangandani Dam), following days of heavy rain associated with the Summer Monsoon. 

Damage caused by a flash flood which swept through a residential block for workers at a hydroelectric dam in Arunachal Pradesh, India, on 24 June 2026. ANI.

About thirty houses were destroyed at the dam workers colony, with another ten houses destroyed and fourteen damaged in related incidents in neighbouring communities, which have also been hit by flooding and landslide events caused by heavy rains in the area. Landslides are a common problem after severe weather, as excess pore water pressure can overcome cohesion in soil and sediments, allowing them to flow like liquids. Approximately 90% of all landslides are caused by heavy rainfall. Several major roads in the area have also been damaged, and the heavy rains are making air transport difficult, hampering the efforts of rescue workers.

Arunchal Pradesh has a monsoon season that begins around the end of April or beginning of May and ends around September, bringing 2-4000 mm of rain to the region each year. In the twenty four hours prior to the incident, 74 mm of rainfall had fallen in the area, which is high, but should not have been sufficient to cause flooding at a camp with flood defences on a dam lake where the water level can be controlled to some extent by releasing water from the dam. This has led to speculation that an earlier incident, such as a landslide, may have temporarily blocked the flow of the river upstream of the dam lake, and that when this temporary blockage failed, a large amount of water surged downstream overcoming the colony's flood defences.

Monsoons are tropical sea breezes triggered by heating of the land during the warmer part of the year (summer). Both the land and sea are warmed by the Sun, but the land has a lower ability to absorb heat, radiating it back so that the air above landmasses becomes significantly warmer than that over the sea, causing the air above the land to rise and drawing in water from over the sea; since this has also been warmed it carries a high evaporated water content, and brings with it heavy rainfall. In the tropical dry season the situation is reversed, as the air over the land cools more rapidly with the seasons, leading to warmer air over the sea, and thus breezes moving from the shore to the sea (where air is rising more rapidly) and a drying of the climate. 

Diagrammatic representation of wind and rainfall patterns in a tropical monsoon climate. Geosciences/University of Arizona.

This situation is particularly intense in South Asia, due to the presence of the Himalayas. High mountain ranges tend to force winds hitting them upwards, which amplifies the South Asian Summer Monsoon, with higher winds leading to more upward air movement, thus drawing in further air from the sea. However, despite the incidents in Arunachal Pradesh this week, the Indian Monsoon is predicted to be be week this year, due to a developing el Niño system over the southern Pacific Ocean, leading to concerns that the country could suffer widespread droughts and famine this year.

The el Niño is the warm phase of a long-term climatic oscillation affecting the southern Pacific, which can influence the climate around the world. The onset of el Niño conditions is marked by a sharp rise in temperature and pressure over the southern Indian Ocean, which then moves eastward over the southern Pacific. This pulls rainfall with it, leading to higher rainfall over the Pacific and lower rainfall over South Asia. This reduced rainfall during the already hot and dry summer leads to soaring temperatures in southern Asia, followed by a rise in rainfall that often causes flooding in the Americas and sometimes Africa. Worryingly climatic predictions for the next century suggest that global warming could lead to more frequent and severe el Niño conditions, extreme weather conditions a common occurrence.

See also...

South African diamond mining company files for bankruptcy after five miners killed in flood.

South African mining company Ekapa Minerals has filed for liquidation following the death of five miners at its Ekapa Joint Shaft Mine at Kimberly in Northern Cape Province, South Africa, on 17 February 2026. The miners have been missing presumed dead since a slurry of water and mud rapidly filled the section of the mine where they were working. The area where the incident occurred was located 890 m below ground, and had only recently been opened up, and life support systems had been installed, but the sudden nature of the flood has led the mine operators to conclude that the incident was not survivable, and, following several days of attempts to reach and clear the site, that there is little hope of recovering the bodies of the lost miners.

A mine rescue team entering the Ekapa Joint Shaft Mine site this week. SABC News.

Floods and inrushes typically occur when miners accidentally break through into pockets of water and gas trapped within rocks. Since such buried waters are often under high pressure due to the weight of rocks above them, they tend to escape into the mine rapidly, and on occasion explosively, leading to a highly dangerous situation in which miners are often rapidly overwhelmed. Such inrushes can also occur when miners encounter flooded disused mineworkings, a danger in areas where mining has occurred for a long time but good records have not been kept. The Ekapa mine had a history of flood inrush events, and the company had been warned by a parliamentary committee in 2025 that steps needed to be taken to avoid future events of this kind.

The Ekapa Joint Shaft Mine site. SABC News.

The closure of the mine is predicted to result in the loss of about 1200 jobs, a crisis for the city of Kimberly, which has a population of just under 97 000 people, and is already suffering from high unemployment rates due to the decline of the diamond industry. Furthermore, workers from the site report that they have not received their salaries for the month of February 2026, placing many of the in a very difficult situation financially. 

Ekapa Minerals purchased the Joint Shaft Mine from mining giant De Beers in 2016, and at the time of closure it was the last surviving diamond mine in Kimberly. In theory, the site could be sold on to another mining company following the liquidation process, but it is unclear if a buyer will be found given the mine's problems and a fluctuating diamond market.

The location of Kimberley in Northern Cape Province, South Africa. Google Maps.

Kimberly was founded in the 1870s following the discovery of diamonds in the area, and rapidly became a centre of wealth in the Cape Colony, opening South Africa's first stock exchange in 1881, and becoming the second city in the world to install electric street lighting the following year. However, in recent years the city's mines have closed one-by-one as the industry has become less viable. The long history of mining in the area means that there are no diamonds left close to the surface, and while they can still be found at greater depths, these are generally fairly small, making it hard for these mines to compete with either shallow, open pit mines elsewhere, or artificial lab-grown diamonds.

See also...

Four fishermen killed by Hippopotamuses by Lake Naivasha, Kenya.

Four members of a group of ten fishermen have been killed after being attacked by Hippopotamuses by Lake Naivasha in Kenya on Friday 2 January 2025. The group, who have been described as local youths, approached the lake after dark as they lacked fishing permits, and are thought to have disturbed a group of Hippos with calves. Six of the party were able to escape by entering the water and swimming, or by climbing trees. One of the deceased is described as having initially escaped, but to have returned in an attempt to rescue a friend. 

Hippopotamuses by Lake Naivasha, Kenya. The Sunday Standard.

Lake Naivasha is noted for undergoing marked variations in its depth, and therefore extent. Water levels in the lake dropped continuously during the first half of the twentieth century, falling to 60 cm in 1945, then rose steadily for over two decades, reaching 6 m in 1968. The waters then fell until 1987, when the lake was only 2.25 m deep, but have been trending upwards since this time, causing the land to expand, swamping low lying villages and farmland, something which has accelerated in recent years as warming global temperatures have led to increased rainfall in East Africa.

One upshot of this that the lake naturally contains no commercially harvestable fish, probably as a result of drying up on occasions in the past. Non-native fish have been introduced to the lake in order to create a commercial fishery, but this has proven difficult to manage, with a dramatic fish-population crash fuelled by overfishing in 2001 leading to the introduction of strict fishing regulations on the lake.

This has created in a fish stock available to commercial fishing companies, and foreign tourists, but not to local villagers, resulting in frequent attempts to circumnavigate the regulations, for example by fishing at night. This has become more of a problem as the lake has expanded, swallowing up farmland and leaving the local population looking for other sources of sustenance. The expansion of the commercial flower growing industry, which earns the nation hard currency but also takes up farmland in the Rift Valley around lakes such as Naivasha and employs a relatively low number of people, has also tended to push people towards illicit economic activities such as night fishing, as well as fuelling conflict between Humans and aquatic wildlife such as Hippopotamuses and Crocodiles.

Flooding in a community beside Lake Naivasha in November 2025. Tony Karumba/AFP.

While Hippos can appear benign to people unfamiliar to them, they are generally considered to be one of the most dangerous Animals in Africa, and probably the world. Hippopotamuses are the largest land Mammals after Elephants and Rhinoceroses, as well as being the closest terrestrial relatives of Whales. Adult Hippos typically weigh about 1.4 tonnes (males tend to be slightly larger than females, but this is marginal, and the sex of Hippos can be hard to differentiate). Hippos can open their mouths to almost 110°, and their jaws are highly muscled, allowing them to slap there mouths shut abruptly, driving canine and incisor teeth that can be 50 cm long into anything which offends them. This weapon is primarily used in intraspecific fights particularly between the males, which are highly territorial. However, they are also notoriously aggressive towards other species, particularly Humans, possibly as a result as having evolved alongside Pliocene and Pleistocene hunting Hominids. Hippopotamuses tend to stay in the water during the day, lowering the threat they present to Humans, but come out of the water to graze at night, when they are generally considered to be at their most dangerous.

See also...