Menace of Flash Floods in Urban Areas

Context and background Land is defined as the top most part of the earth surface, which is utilized by human beings and other ecosystems for livelihood. It is a limited resource that calls for a proper land planning and management system. Besides the sustainable land planning being promoted in many countries governed by set laws and regulations, promoted by many bodies such as Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and vision 2030, poor planning has been promoted in the system through corruption agencies. Therefore, the main objective of the study was to find out the menace of flash floods in urban areas due to poor planning, a case study of Nairobi County. The study utilized Landsat imageries and ArcGIS Pro. in creation of flood risk map in Nairobi County. Goal and Objectives: The study aimed at finding out the menace of flash floods in urban areas due to poor planning, a case study of Nairobi County. Methodology: The study utilized Landsat 8 for April-June, 2024 which were sourced from USGS, it also deployed rainfall, population and soil data. The study utilized questionnaires for ground truthing. Results: The study results reveled that most of flash floods within Nairobi County is due to poor land planning practices. Most constructions are done along the water ways, river riparian and rivers tributaries which leads to excessive flooding during rainy seasons. The study also shows that there are no clear dumpsites set for the increasing population resulting to much of the waste getting its way into river bodies and water ways leading to the blockages thus resulting to flush floods within the city. The pie charts and bar graphs generated from the questionnaire results showed that poor planning had the highest percentages of 90%