At least 17 dead as heavy rain triggers flash floods in Afghanistan | Climate crisis news

The dead include five members of a family from Kabkan district in Herat province.

Heavy rain and snow in Afghanistan ended a prolonged drought but triggered flash floods in several areas, killing at least 17 people and injuring 11 others, authorities said.

The dead included five members of a family living in a property whose roof collapsed on Thursday in Kabkan, a district of Herat province, said Mohammad Yousaf Saeedi, spokesman for the Herat governor. Two of the victims were children.

Most of the casualties have occurred since Monday in flood-hit districts, and bad weather has also disrupted daily life in the central, northern, southern and western regions, according to Mohammad Yousaf Hammad, spokesman for the Afghan National Disaster Management Authority (ANDMA).

Hammad said the floods damaged infrastructure, killed livestock and affected 1,800 families, worsening conditions in already vulnerable urban and rural communities.

He added that the agency had sent assessment teams to the hardest-hit areas, and surveys were underway to determine other needs.

A video clip posted on X showed a truck overturning due to flash flooding on Afghanistan’s Herat-Kandahar highway near Dasht-e Bakwa.

Another video showed several people desperately trying to escape after their bus overturned in a strong flood current.

Afghanistan, like neighboring Pakistan and India, is strongly vulnerable to extreme weather eventsparticularly flash floods following seasonal rains.

Decades of conflict, poor infrastructure, deforestation and the intensifying effects of climate change have amplified the impact of these disasters, particularly in remote areas where many houses are built of mud and offer limited protection.

In August, a magnitude of 6.0 earthquake struck Afghanistan near its border with Pakistan, killing more than 1,400 people.

Efforts to rescue those affected by the earthquake were hampered by flash floods in Afghanistan’s Nangarhar province, which borders Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.

The United Nations and other humanitarian agencies warned this week that Afghanistan is expected to remain one of the world’s largest humanitarian crises in 2026.

The UN and its humanitarian partners on Tuesday launched an appeal for $1.7 billion to help nearly 18 million people in urgent need in the country.