Satellite imagery is starting to reveal the aftermath of a major rainfall event that struck the area around Rason, North Korea, at the end of August 2026. The blog post cites an NK Pro report suggesting that about 266 millimetres of rain fell between 31 August and 1 September, triggering landslides and floods that damaged infrastructure, industry, and houses. The region is known to be landslide-prone, but information about such events there is often scarce.
Images captured by Planet Labs on 27 August, before the event, and on 3 September, after it, show multiple shallow landslides in the hills to the west and north of Rason. In many places these slides have merged into channelised debris flows, with a notable cluster directly west of the city. The rivers appear choked with debris, and a plume of sediment extends from the river mouth into the bay.
The author of the report notes that access to Planet Labs imagery is delayed by about a month, and a cloud-free image acquired on 9 September 2026 should allow a more detailed analysis. For now, the visible landslides around Rason look to be quite significant.