Elgon

This approach has been tried out in several different circumstances: before a cyclone was due to make landfall in Mozambique last March, before a hurricane brought torrential rains to Central America last October, and now, to help people move away from the landslide-prone slopes of Mount Elgon in Uganda.

Mrs Kitutu rose to prominence as an environmental scientist, and was involved in mapping her home region in Mt Elgon, which is prone to landslides.

The bus was coming from the Ugandan town of Mbale and it crashed on Saturday night after crossing into Kenya on the way to the capital, Nairobi, said Rodgers Taitika, the Elgon regional police spokesman in Uganda.

Du Toit's torrent frog — Last seen on Kenya's Mount Elgon in 1962, this evolutionarily unique frog was part of a group of species that split off from other amphibians 70 million years ago.

"Mapping appealed to me. I went to Mount Elgon in the east. I still have pictures from my very first field work because it was really exciting," she says, beaming.