How did the floods and rebellions of 1352 lead Zhu Yuanzhang to join an uprising?

By the 1340s, the Yuan dynasty government had been severely weakened by administrative ineptitude and internal factionalism. This instability was exacerbated in 1351 by disastrous flooding of the Huang (Yellow) and Huai river basins, which devastated the region and incited hundreds of thousands of long-oppressed farmers to rise in open rebellion.1

Zhu Yuanzhang, who would later become the Hongwu emperor, joined this wave of unrest in 1352. He enlisted in the rebel forces led by Guo Zixing, who had successfully attacked and captured the city of Haozhou that same year. Zhu quickly distinguished himself as a capable military leader, rising to second-in-command before eventually assuming full leadership of the rebel army following Guo Zixing's death in 1355. This period of widespread turmoil provided the opportunity for Zhu to transition from his early life into a prominent military and political figure, ultimately leading to the founding of the Ming dynasty.231