Over a Thousand Dead in Africa's Floods, Almost Half in Chad

The death toll from flooding caused by torrential rains in Chad since the end of July has risen to 487, almost half of more than a thousand flood fatalities in Central and East Africa.

According to information released today by the Chadian authorities to the EFE news agency, Chad has recorded 146 deaths resulting from the floods in the last week alone.

In Nigeria, the death toll has also increased from 259 to 269, and more than 640,000 people have had to leave their homes, the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) reported today.

"To date, we have recorded 487 deaths related to the floods and almost 1.7 million people affected (...). It is an alarming number and we are asking for help from Chadian partners," the vice-president of the National Committee for Flood Prevention and Management, Mahamat Assileck Halata, told EFE, confirming the figures released last Friday by the United Nations.

According to Halata, the rains destroyed 200,000 homes and more than 355,000 hectares of agricultural land, while 66,000 head of livestock were lost in a phenomenon that affected 117 of the country's 120 departments.

The areas where the most deaths were recorded are the provinces of Logone Est and Mayo-Kebbi Ouest, in the south of the country, and Ouaddaï and Wadi Fira, in the east, although the province of Lac (west) had the highest number of people affected by the disaster.

"All the fields are flooded. Our crops are rotting in the water. This situation does not bode well for tomorrow: if people do not harvest what they sowed, there will be famine in the coming months," lamented Jonas Masra, a resident of the city of Sarh, in the province of Moyen-Chari (south), also speaking to EFE.

In addition to Chad, heavy rains have been hitting several countries in West and Central Africa for months, including Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), the Central African Republic (CAR), Togo, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Niger and Mali.

The situation is worsening the circumstances of a population already vulnerable due to chronic poverty, underdevelopment, conflict and political instability.

According to figures also released today by the Bloomberg news agency, floods in a swath of Central and West Africa have left at least 2.9 million people homeless, in addition to devastating crops in a region already experiencing food shortages and insecurity.

The heavy rains in the western half of the semi-arid Sahel zone, which borders Africa's Sahara Desert, are likely to continue, according to the Famine Early Warning Systems Network.

This year’s deluge — which coincides with a crucial harvest season — is blamed by experts on global warming.

A large part of the Sahara will receive more than 500 percent of its normal September rainfall, according to Severe Weather Europe, a weather forecaster.

The International Rescue Group has described the flooding in the region as the worst in 30 years, and estimates from the Climate Hazards Center at the University of California, Santa Barbara, show that large swathes of Mali and Mauritania have seen their highest rainfall levels on record in the first 10 days of September, according to Bloomberg.