The rains are upon Greater Accra once again, and the winds brought with them havoc in parts of the city, particularly East Legon.
Tornadoes, hurricanes, and cyclones do not occur in Ghana, but the aftermath of the recent rainstorms would leave some Accra residents thinking they had just woken up in Florida and Hurricane Helen had just visited.
A furious rainstorm on Tuesday, March 25, 2025, left a trail of devastation as giant billboards, electrical poles, telephone lines, building roofs, and other structures came crumbling down.
Some of the giant billboards fell on other structures and properties, destroying them in the process, while others have become death traps that may fall with the slightest blow of the wind.
A drive down Lagos Avenue, La Bawaleshie Road, Trinity Avenue, and the Boundary Road within the Ayawaso West Municipality tells a story of destruction that does not resonate with the ‘elite tag’ given to Legon by some Ghanaians.
In one instance at the American House lorry station, a falling billboard landed on a lotto kiosk with the owner trapped under the rubble.
Another fell on a small structure belonging to a food vendor.
Although the lotto operator escaped unharmed, the food vendor was not so lucky, as she sustained injuries on her hands from broken glass.
To add salt to injury, all her belongings at the little food joint were smashed beyond repairs.
It took the intervention of some drivers at the station to pull them out of the rubble.
A similar incident off Trinity Avenue, near the Institute of Chartered Accountants, led to the destruction of some cars after some of the many billboards that fell in the vicinity crushed some luxury cars.
This comes in the wake of the A&C Mall incident, where over 80 cars were also damaged, some beyond repairs, after the roof of a carport came down with the rain from the heavens.
During a visit to one of the affected garages, Sir Isaac Motors, the owner, Mr Isaac Dapaah Boateng, confirmed to The Ghana Report that the billboards fell on four of the cars on display for sale.
The cars included a Ford Edge, two Toyota Rav4s, and a Mercedes-Benz C300.
Counting his losses, Mr. Boateng said the damage will cost over GHS 350,000.
“Since the billboard is heavy and contains metals, when it dropped on them, each one of their roofs developed problems and the glassy parts shattered. The first one, for instance, the boot and the roof is beyond repairs,” he lamented.
He added that this was the second such incident.
He recounted that about two years ago, another heavy rainstorm brought down a billboard, damaging his cars in the process.
Although he has yet to report this incident to the authorities, he complained that a report during the first incident was ignored.
“You see Ghana, when it happens like this, it becomes ‘cry your own cry'”.
Meanwhile, the advertising company responsible for some of the billboards was already at work, pulling them back up and fixing the canvas.
But as the rainy season intensifies, with several billboards, poles and structures already clinging on to their last days, should East Legon brace up for many of these incidents?
