Compounding risk at the climate–conflict interface: forced displacement and informal urbanisation in the 2017 Mocoa debris-flow disaster (Colombia)

On the night of March 31, 2017, the city of Mocoa, Colombia, suffered a series of landslides and debris flows triggered by extreme rainfall. Despite the existence of prior warnings of possible landslides, the event unfortunately resulted in 332 deaths, 398 injuries, and affected more than 7,700 families. Mocoa has long received populations displaced by armed conflict over recent decades, a process that has contributed to the rapid and informal urban expansion along river corridors and unstable slopes, increasing exposure to hydroclimatic hazards. 

This study examines the disaster through an integrated disaster risk perspective, asking how the event was shaped by the conjunction of multiple factors, including the conflict-driven displacement, land governance, together with hydroclimatic extremes and limited monitoring capacity. We based our findings on a document review of planning instruments, available hazard mapping, documentation on early-warning arrangements, and the hydrometeorological context, complemented by GIS-based spatial analysis of affected areas in relation to mapped hazard zones and municipal-level conflict/displacement indicators.

The results of the Mocoa case illustrate how structural risk conditions associated with forced displacement and governance challenges persist. Post-2017 investments have improved warning systems and local monitoring, but underlying risk drivers, including displacement, governance limitations, and inadequate planning tools, remain unaddressed.

With this study, rather than proposing a solution, we discuss the implications for disaster risk management and anticipatory action in a humanitarian context,  including integrating displacement dynamics into multi-risk assessments, designing response protocols that account for unequal capacity to act, and aligning land governance and early warning to mitigate the impact on populations already affected by violence and displacement.