2020 East Africa floods

The 2020 East Africa floods were a natural disaster in Rwanda, Kenya, Somalia, Burundi, Ethiopia, Uganda, Democratic Republic of Congo, Djibouti and Tanzania, affecting at least 700,000 people. They began when excessive rains began falling in March, leading to massive flooding and landslides. They caused more than 430 deaths, notably in Kenya and Rwanda. In the fall another round of floods hit the African Sahel.

Floods are the most frequent type of natural disaster and occur when an overflow of water submerges land that is usually dry. Floods are often caused by heavy rainfall, rapid snowmelt or a storm surge from a tropical cyclone or tsunami in coastal areas. Disastrous floods have caused millions of fatalities in the twentieth century, tens of billions of dollars of direct economic loss each year, and significant disruption to global trade.