September 13, 2022 - Flooding in Cameroon

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A travel website describes Cameroon as, “Africa’s throbbing heart, a
sultry mosaic of active volcanoes, white-sand beaches, thick rainforest
and magnificent parched landscapes broken up by the bizarre rock
formation of the Sahel”. With a richly divergent landscape packed into
a country slightly larger than the U.S. state of California, the
country sits in West-Central Africa, nestled between Nigeria in the
west; Chad in the northeast; the Central African Republic to the east;
then Republic of Congo, Gabon, and Equatorial Guinea in the south. It
also enjoys almost 14 miles of coastline along the Gulf of Guinea. The
population, which tends to be young—60 percent are under 25 years of
age, according to the CIA World Factbook—live primarily in the western
coastal area and the north. In addition to the normal population, more
than 500,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs) and about 70,000
Nigerian refugees live in the north, near the borders with Nigeria and
Chad.

The northern part of the country enjoys a warm, tropical climate. The
dry season brings sunshine and hot temperatures from October to May.
Each year, rains begin to fall in June and continue through September.
Floods are common in the rainy season, as rivers swell and spill into
the floodplains. At times, the flooding can be catastrophic.

The 2022 rainy season in Cameroon started early and vigorously, with
flash floods in Bamenda, the capital of North West Region, killing two
people on June 26. By June 30, flooding in Yaoundé, capital of
Cameroon, killed at least one other person. On August 11, a
rain-triggered landslide in Widikum, North West Region, killed five
people and injured several more. On that date, floods also inundated
parts of the South West Region and caused widespread damage.

On September 12, the Voice of America (VOA) reported that weeks of
flooding along the northern borders with Chad and Nigeria was so severe
that Cameroon’s officials say that entire villages have been swept
away, leaving thousands homeless. The August and September floods have
devastated cropland in the north, which is considered a breadbasket for
the region, raising concerns of hunger following the floods, especially
if the rains delay the new planting season that begins in October. VOA
also reports that Christophe Bring, the head of department for studies
and projects at Cameroon’s environment ministry, “said the ongoing
floods in northern Cameroon are caused by heavy rainfall resulting from
tropical weather disruptions, deforestation and improper agricultural
practices. He said thousands of families have gone homeless because
they constructed houses and settlements in flood plains."

The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on board
NASA’s Aqua satellite acquired a false-color image of severe flooding
in northern Cameroon on September 7, 2022. Using the NASA Worldview
App, we compare this image with an Aqua MODIS image acquired of the
same area on August 6, 2022. To visualize the comparison, simply click
on the arrow on the image and move your cursor back and forth. Although
rains had already caused flooding in some areas on August 6, the change
in widespread inundation only a month later is obvious.

Scientists use this type of false color image, which uses visible light
and near infrared light (MODIS bands 7,2,1) to help separate water,
which appears deep blue, from vegetation, which looks bright green.
Open or sparsely vegetated land looks tan while cloud may look white or
tinted with electric blue.

Image Facts
Satellite: Aqua
Date Acquired: 9/7/2022
Resolutions: 1km (360.1 KB), 500m (969.6 KB), 250m (587.6
KB)
Bands Used: 7,2,1
Image Credit: MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA GSFC



https://modis.gsfc.nasa.gov/gallery/individual.php?db_date=2022-09-13

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