One of Zambia's largest rivers, the Kafue River swells and shrinks with seasonal rains in an ordinary year. The rainy season that set in over southern Africa in late 2007 and early 2008, however, was not ordinary.

The rains started early and continued steadily into February. By February 8, 2008, when the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA's Aqua satellite captured the top image, the Kafue River was many kilometers wider than it had been two months earlier, lower image. The river, black in this image, balloons around its dry-season channel. The flooded river is shallow, and a web of green vegetation traces through the flood. Scattered clouds overhead are light blue and white.

The Kafue River winds across flat wetlands in this region, making it particularly prone to flooding. Water levels on the river may continue to rise as rain falls on the northern extents of the river basin, said the United Nations country team in Zambia on February 1. Daily images of the Kafue River are available from the MODIS Rapid Response System.

References

United Nations Country Team in Zambia. (2008, February 1). Zambian Floods Humanitarian Bulletin No. 1. ReliefWeb. Accessed February 11, 2008.