The low places along the Nyamwamba that go under in heavy rain, why they do, which rainy season it is right now, and what the weather model expects next. Not a flood warning — those still come by radio.
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From Town Tools. For the current version, visit https://www.towntools.org/kasese-kasese-ug/where-does-it-flood
Kasese floods in the same low places, and it has done so most years since 2013 — at least twice a year since 2014, according to division officials. This page is the plain list: which parts of the town and the valley go under, why they go under, and where the year stands in the two rainy seasons.
It is not a flood warning and it never will be one. The warnings that count come from Uganda Wildlife Authority staff stationed up in the mountains, are passed on by district officials and LC chairpersons, and reach people by radio. Keep a radio on during the rains.
Kasese has two pages about this river and they answer different questions. "Rain on the Mountains" answers how much rain is falling high in the Rwenzori, where the Nyamwamba's floods are born: www.towntools.org/kasese-kasese-ug/rain-on-the-mountains. This page answers which low places go under when that water comes down, and which season you are in now.
Right now: the August–November rains — the heavier wet season
Some rain in the forecast, nothing heavy.
The wettest of the next three days looks like Tuesday, 13 October, with about 4 mm expected.
The real warnings come by radio
Flood warnings in Kasese travel by people, not by apps. Uganda Wildlife Authority staff stationed up in the Rwenzori watch the rivers — the Nyamwamba, Nyamugasani, Lhubiriha and Rwimi — and send alerts down; district officials and LC chairpersons pass them on; radio carries them the last mile. During the rains keep a radio on: Kasese Guide Radio is on 100.5 FM and broadcasts in seven languages, Messiah Radio on 97.5 FM. As the 2026 season began the district disaster committee said it was following the five-day forecasts and urged people living next to the riverbanks to evacuate early rather than wait. If water is rising, move first and tell your neighbours; check a page like this one later.
These are weather-model estimates of rainfall, not measurements, and never a flood forecast. Heavy rain on the hills is a reason to be watchful; calm skies are never a promise.
After a flood, treat the water as unsafe
Floodwater mixes with the drains and with whatever it has run through, and Kasese's piped supply comes down the same Nyamwamba valley — when it fails, people here have been reported taking water from streams, roadside drainage channels and the river itself. After heavy rain, boil or properly treat anything you or your family will drink, and stay out of standing floodwater where you can: you cannot see how deep it is or what is in it.
Where the river works stand
Desilting has been done in stretches, not along the whole river: from 2022 a contractor worked about 5.4 km across three hotspots, at Masule, Kyanjuki, Kyanjuki camp, Namuhuga and Kyonjojo. Residents in Bulembia say the promise to desilt fully has not been kept, and division leaders have asked for strong gabions as well. As of March 2026 a Nyamwamba master project put at over UGX 350 billion was in final planning, with consultations, feasibility studies and design reported complete (The Cooperator, June 2023; Nile Post, March 2026).
Where the town floods
The same low places go under in heavy rain, every wet season. If you live, work or travel through one of these, plan around the low roads before the rain sets in.
Kyondo, Majengo and Kihara Road
Nyamwamba
The stretch of Nyamwamba Division closest to the river, and the first places named whenever the rains start. As the 2026 season opened, residents here reported the water already eating away the banks towards their houses; the LC I chairperson of Kyondo asked for the river to be pushed back into its original channel (Sanyu FM, March 2026).
Kanyangeya
Nyamwamba
Just along from Kyondo. The danger here is not only the river: in March 2026 a marram-built house collapsed in a heavy downpour and a seven-year-old boy was hurt. Houses built of marram weaken with each season of rain (Sanyu FM, March 2026).
Congo Quarter
Bulembia
Up the valley on the Nyamwamba. Residents here have watched the floods take property year after year while the promise to fully desilt the river went unkept. In the June 2023 floods the Bulembia division chairperson had five schools closed as a precaution (The Cooperator, June 2023).
Kilembe and the upper valley
Bulembia
Twelve kilometres up the Nyamwamba, where the river is steepest and where the town's piped water is drawn from. The May 2020 flood submerged Kilembe Mines Hospital — wards, mortuary and drug store washed away — and the hospital was closed, its services moved about 8 km down into Kasese town.
Why it floods here
The Nyamwamba is short, steep and fast. It drops off the high Rwenzori and crosses the municipality in a matter of hours, so a storm on the mountains can arrive here as a wall of water while the sky over town is still clear — and the sibling rivers, Mubuku, Nyamugasani, Lhubiriha, Rwimi, Sebwe and Hima, behave the same way across the district. What has made it worse is on the ground rather than in the sky: local reporting names a riverbed silted up until the channel is too narrow, cultivation and construction pushed right to the banks, and slopes upstream cleared of trees. The river has burst its banks roughly every year since 2013 and, division officials say, at least twice a year since 2014.
“Nyamwamba floods are unpredictable because the river floods anytime whether there is rain or not”
Who to call when it floods
Emergencies first, then the bodies that respond to flooding and water safety.
Police, fire and ambulance
Emergencies — when someone is in danger · Free from any mobile. 999 also works.
Coordinates flood preparedness, early warning and evacuation for the district, and announces through local leaders and radio · We could not verify a direct phone line for the committee — reach it through the municipal council below or your LC chairperson.
Kasese Municipal Council
Rain forecast read 12 October at 14:48. Rainfall figures are model estimates from Open-Meteo (CC BY 4.0).
The Kyanjuki–Bulembia bridge and the valley road
Bulembia
The crossing has been destroyed more than once. When the river takes the road, the upper valley is cut off from town: in June 2023 the Nyamwamba burst its banks and blocked people from getting from Kilembe into Kasese at all. That stops farm produce reaching the market as surely as it stops people (The Cooperator, June 2023).
Anywhere built up to the riverbank
The Nyamwamba cuts through the middle of the municipality, and local reporting blames the banks as much as the rain: a silted riverbed that has narrowed the channel, cultivation and building right up to the water's edge, and cleared slopes upstream. If your plot sits on the bank or in an old channel, you are in the flood's way wherever in town you are (The Observer, 2023).
The major drainage channels
The channels have to carry storm water away; where they are built in or blocked, the water goes into houses instead. After floods killed two people in September 2024, the district disaster management team told residents whose homes stand in the major drainage channels to vacate, and said there would be no compensation. Enforcement is bitterly contested, because the channels are where the poorest households settled (The Independent, September 2024).
Drainage, roads and the division offices — Central, Nyamwamba and Bulembia