The El Molo tribe has lived on the shore of Lake Turkana in Kenya for millennia. Rising water levels submerged the village of Komote and turned it into an island two years ago. Mombasa Lenapir, a resident of Komote, built a new home with other families on the mainland in fear of being engulfed by the expanding lake. Others decided to use canoes to travel between the island and the mainland.

Lenapir, 70, described how only a few years ago children used to walk to school on the land, which is now submerged. "Now parents have to pay boat owners for their children to get to school. It is difficult for the sick to get medical assistance, especially at night,” he said.

A pumping station that delivered freshwater was also swallowed by the water, leaving the El Molo people to rely on one of Africa's most saline lakes for their water, which puts them at risk for many water-borne infections due to excessive concentrations of fluoride.

The lake is a Unesco World Heritage site that has grown in size by more than 10% in the previous decade, burying about 800 square kilometers of land. It has ruined El Molo's fishing grounds, demolished freshwater infrastructure, absorbed burial grounds, and swamped the community.

According to a government-approved report published in 2021, the rise in water levels in Lake Turkana and other Rift valley lakes is due to increased rainfall in the lakes' catchment areas in recent years, unsustainable land-use practices that result in the soil in runoff water, and geological activities within the Rift valley system.

According to a 2021 UN Environment Programme research, the climate crisis would cause higher rains over the lake's primary river inflows, causing a further rise in water levels over the next 20 years, with significant social, cultural, and economic repercussions. The report details how flooding which occurred in 2020 will likely become more common in the future. "The new evidence of continuing rising lake water levels is partially based on climate change scenarios and a predicted change in rainfall patterns,” says the report.

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Nearing extinction

The El Molo tribe is already facing extinction with a population of 1,000. Their language is categorized as extinct by Unesco's Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger since no native El Molo can speak the dialect well.

Their food is mostly comprised of fish collected using traditional spears, harpoons, and nets. Their primary source of income has been impacted by the lake's expansion.

A local tour guide Julius Loyok says it is too windy to travel further offshore to find fish since boats are prone to capsize. "Without a decent daily supply of fish, our lives are jeopardized since we can't produce because the entire area is rocky," Lenapir explains.

“Our language is dead, our culture is going and our homes are being swallowed by the water,” he says.

Water practically laps several homes in neighboring Layeni hamlet, and half of the tombs in the community burial ground are drowned. The second part, nearly a few meters from the lake, is expected to drown soon. The sight of tombs beneath the water is especially upsetting in a society where the deceased are venerated.

“This is painful. Sometimes you need moments of solitude here. But now I have to ride a canoe with other people to reach the submerged graves. We buried the dead and now the graves are buried too,” says Lenapir.

The Desert Museum, located a few kilometers from the El Molo settlements, contains various artifacts from the community, such as food and tobacco containers and tortoise shells used as plates.

According to Ntalan Ogom, the museum's keeper and an El Molo community member, this may be the only site where future generations will learn about a vanished tribe, an extinct language, and a disappearing civilization.

“We relied on the lake to live. Now it’s killing our people," said Ogom.