At least thirty people died in Conakry on Sunday after a mound of rubbish at a landfill gave way before dawn and crashed onto homes next door, the government said. Heavy rain had soaked the site. The collapse struck around 2:00am in Dar-es-salam, in the Bbessia area on the edge of the capital. Six other people were badly hurt.
Officials said crews and machines were sent in to look for anyone still buried, to treat the injured and to recover the dead. Prime Minister Amadou Oury Bah went to the scene, where excavators worked through the wreckage as neighbours looked on. The government said the wounded were being treated and that help would reach families hit by the disaster.
Before the official count came out, neighbourhood leader Lancine Sylla said he feared a high death toll. The eighteen bodies had already been taken to the morgue.
Former prime minister Cellou Dalein Diallo, now living abroad, called it a tragedy that leaves the country shaken. He said the dump had been due to close that same Sunday, 23 August, and urged the authorities to explain, in the open, how the disaster happened and what they will do next. In the days before the collapse, people living around the site had been ordered to leave because of the risk that the mound would give way.
Guinea is led by General Mamadi Doumbouya, who took power in a 2021 coup and was elected president in December 2025.
