Africa Lightning Casualty Database Since 2018 and Analysis

Despite being the most common weather threat to life globally, lightning strikes are often underestimated in their severity and impact, particularly in regions like Africa where the risk is disproportionately high. Few people realize that lightning kills more people per capita annually in many African countries than other more widely recognized disasters such as flooding rains and landslides that receive more attention. Unfortunately, because each incident might claim only a few lives, but the number of incidents is very large, the lack of the recognition has led to underestimate of its collective toll on communities.

The African Centres for Lightning and Electromagnetics Network (ACLENet) staff and citizen reporters have been systematically collecting and reporting lightning casualty cases across Africa since 2018, although many reports are included from prior years. Sources include Google searches, local news including those in African local languages, and submissions from the citizens, which may not have made the news in either radio, online or print. By December 2023, the database included more than 800 reports from 41 countries (out of 55 countries in Africa), the largest database on lightning casualty in Africa to our knowledge. Our goal is to advertise this public database to potential researchers and others to help understand the patterns of lightning risks in African countries.

Preliminary results show that around 75% of the lightning casualties occurred in the rainy season (October to April in south and east Africa) and 62% in the evenings. There is little difference in the gender reporting of the lightning casualties among the regions. Individual countries have subtle differences in the distributions but share some general patterns. In addition, some of these reports include reference to lightning safety myths that resulted in incorrect response to lightning leading to unnecessary deaths or injuries.