Accra under water after 6 hours of downpour
Parts of Accra, the national capital, were submerged under water yesterday after about six hours of rainfall.
Advertisement
Even though no serious damage was recorded, the rains, which started from 4 a.m. to 10 a.m., caused a lot of inconvenience to both motorists and pedestrians with some vehicles getting stuck on the roads.
Pedestrians faced difficulties making their way around gutters and pools of water to go about their daily activities.
Economic activities were generally slow, as some workers and traders remained in their homes as a result of the rainfall.
Some students and pupils too were not able to go to school while some schools were flooded.
Some major drains in the capital overflowed their banks while the Odaw River brought out all the garbage, including plastic and e-waste, dumped into it.
The floods took over areas such as A-Life at Nungua, Sowutuom, Santa Maria and Race Course.
During a visit by the Daily Graphic to areas including Sakaman, Accra New Town, North Kaneshie, the Kwame Nkrumah Circle, Darkuman, Fadama, Mamprobi and the Obetsebi-Lamptey Circle, it was observed that the rainfall had exposed the poor sanitation situation in parts of Accra.
Mamprobi Police Station flooded
At Mamprobi, the heavy rains once again flooded the Mamprobi District Police Headquarters and barracks, where scores of policemen’s families had been bailing out their homes and kitchens since 2 a.m. yesterday.
The five-building compound, where an estimated 300 to 500 people live, was reduced to a freshwater pond overnight.
In the morning, the Ghana National Fire Service (GNFS) joined the police in a coordinated effort to clear the gutters forming the perimeter of the flood zone.
As policemen in rubber wading boots cleared the drains with hand tools, their families, marooned on the second floor of their homes, looked over their flooded courtyard with concern.
First responders were joined by a group of senior policemen, including the Inspector-General of Police (IGP), Mr Mohammed Ahmed Alhassan.
“When the IGP heard that his barracks was in trouble, he swooped down right away. He always takes a personal interest when it comes to the welfare of his personnel,” Superintendent Cephas Arthur, the Director of Public Affairs of the Ghana Police Service, said.
He added that since the flooding had not yet reached “an alarming level”, there were currently no plans to evacuate any of the families.
He said the police and fire personnel stood ready to respond to the needs of the barracks and surrounding homes if the situation became an emergency.
Shallow funds
Workers of the Public Works Department (PWD) were present at the scene to help address the immediate flooding.
On future plans, the Director of Projects, Mr Sika Nartey, explained that the Mamprobi barracks sat on a shallow crater that was in dire need of refilling.
“There was a similar situation about five years ago,” he said, noting that the level of the road was more than a foot higher than the barracks grounds, causing the gutters to regularly overflow.
“After the rains subsided [that year], we developed a proposal to fill the whole compound with gravel, but it couldn’t go through. The money required was a problem],” he explained.
Advertisement
A seasonal blight for police families
“Every single rainy season, we experience this problem, but this has been the worst,” Chief Inspector Anokye, who has lived at the barracks with his family for a decade, said.
The area between his building and his neighbour’s was completely mired in standing water, while the wooden door of his wife’s kitchen showed a water mark nearly two feet high.
Meteorological Services Dept
Meanwhile, at the time of filing this report, the Meteorological Services Department was yet to measure the amount of rainfall which fell yesterday.
According to the Head of Research of the department, Mr Charles Kweku Rock, the measurement would be done today, as had always been the practice.
Advertisement
On whether or not there could be any heavy rainfall in future, he said he was not too certain that there would be another heavy rainfall in the coming days, but he did not rule out the fact that nature could have its own way.