September 20, 2016 By Patrick Jaiah Kamara
Barely a year and few days after flash flood overwhelmed most part of Freetown, residents of the capital city, especially in slum communities, were on 19 September woken up from their sleep by another heavy downpour that flooded homes and left debris strewn everywhere.
“When I woke up last night, I stepped my feet in a pool of water that flooded our entire room. I was a little bit confused as to what was actually happening. Until I saw our books, uniforms and cloths already drenched by the water,” narrated Mariatu Conteh.
Mariatu Conteh is a pupil of the Government Technical Secondary School who resides at Congo Town, west of Freetown. She described her experience as a terrible nightmare because their entire house was flooded.
She said two hours of torrential rain succeeded in carrying away their cooking utensils and many other properties.
Ms. Conteh said she could not be in school yesterday because her school books were destroyed by flood water.
The flood of 16 September last year reportedly left three people dead, with hundreds displaced. Many people had to take temporary shelter at the National Stadium before they were relocated to Mile Six, along the Freetown-Masiaka highway. But others were reluctant to be relocated and returned to their original locations –slum communities in Freetown.
Comparatively, the magnitude of damage caused by last year’s flood is not commensurate to the 19 September, 2016 flood, although there were several incidents of reported cases of destruction.
Community Health Officer (CHO) at the Kroo Bay Community Health Centre, Fatmata Bangura, told Concord Times that all their drugs were destroyed as a result of the flood.
Although she declined to quantify the amount of drugs destroyed by the flood, she admitted that the facility was currently without a single drug.
She noted that the drugs were placed on high tables, which the flood washed away.
The Office of National Security (ONS) on 15 June, 2016 identified 30 disaster prone areas in Freetown and urged residents in those environments to relocate to less disaster prone areas within 90 days, but the said ninety days has elapsed and residents remained in those areas.
They were not available for comment as we went to press last night.