Overall Orange alert Flood
in Malawi

Flood impact summary

This flood is expected to have a medium humanitarian impact based on the magnitude and the affected population and their vulnerability.

GDACS ID: 1101890
Deaths: 225
Displaced: 88312
Region: Southern Region
Countries: Malawi
From - To 13 Mar - 16 Mar
Known identifiers for this event: FL-2023-000037-MWI

GDACS Score

For more info on GDACS alert score click here.

Impact Assessement as of 16-03-2023

SENDAI Indicator A N Country Location Info
death 225 Malawi Southern Region
missing 41 Malawi Southern Region
SENDAI Indicator B N Country Location Info
displaced 88312 Malawi Southern Region
injured 707 Malawi Southern Region

Satellite Observation

Satellite-based Flood extent provided by GLOFAS
Overall of the satellite-based flooded area from / to : 2023-03-06 / 2023-03-23  

Monday 06/03Tuesday 07/03Wednesday 08/03Thursday 09/03Friday 10/03Saturday 11/03Sunday 12/03Monday 13/03Tuesday 14/03Wednesday 15/03Thursday 16/03Friday 17/03Saturday 18/03Sunday 19/03Monday 20/03Tuesday 21/03Wednesday 22/03Thursday 23/03

Timeline of revisions

For accessing reports of previous advisories, please click on the advisory number in the table below.

IDAlert ColorPopulation affectedStart DateEnd DateSource
1 225 deaths and 88312 displaced 13 Mar 2023 16 Mar 2023 GLOFAS

Flood polygons

This polygon (translucent blue with a blue border) is drawn by the analysts recording the flood event. It is meant to include all the areas reported as affected, by official source or the media. It does not represent the area actually under water.

Microwave flood detection

Flooded area, as detected in microwaves by the Global Flood Detection System of the JRC, based on NASA TRMM/GPM observations. This system has a rather low resolution (of 5-10km) but is not affected by clouds.
For more details, see http://www.unisdr.org/files/9622_LBNA23303ENC002.pdf.
The areas with a flood signal along the coast are an artefact of the system and should not be considered.

Optical Flood detection

Flooded area as detected in optical wavelengths by NASA/MODIS, known as "MODIS Flood Product". Data are made available by NASA GSFC Flood Mapping Project, http://oas.gsfc.nasa.gov/floodmap/index.html. Resolution of 250m, heavily affected by cloud cover.