“We are very worried”: less than a month after Chido, the inhabitants of Mayotte are preparing to experience their second cyclone

Chido a causé des dommages colossaux faisant au moins 39 morts et plus de 5 600 blessés. MAXPPP – Michael Bunel/Le Pictorium

L’archipel de Mayotte, placé sous alerte rouge depuis samedi, affronte ce dimanche la tempête tropicale Dikeledi, moins d’un mois après le passage dévastateur du cyclone Chido.

The archipelago is placed on red cyclone alert.

The 320,000 inhabitants of the poorest department in France have been asked to take shelter “in a solid home” or in one of the 79 emergency shelters (schools, youth centers, mosques, etc.) set up in all the municipalities of the archipelago.

The population has been called upon to build up stocks of water and food to “hold out the cyclone”, the prefecture urged.

During the entire duration of the alert, all movement is prohibited except for emergency services and authorized persons.

“It will continue to intensify”

After reaching the northeastern coast of Madagascar on Saturday afternoon, the cyclone began to weaken and be downgraded to a severe tropical storm, with wind gusts that could reach 130 km/h at sea, according to Météo-France. But Dikeledi should gradually regain strength when he leaves the land.

At 05:56 local time (03:56 in Paris), the storm was 260 km off the southeastern coast of the archipelago, moving at a speed of 22 km/h.

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“In terms of impacts, the province of Antsiranana in Madagascar has suffered the most intense conditions in recent hours”, but the intense winds and rains “should gradually diminish” and the conditions “improve during the morning”, specifies Météo-France.

After passing through the Mozambique Channel, Dikeledi is expected to pass just over 100 km south of Mayotte at the tropical storm stage on Sunday afternoon before being reclassified as a tropical cyclone on Monday during the day.

“It will then continue to intensify, possibly reaching the intense tropical cyclone stage by turning south and then southeast at the beginning of next week, more or less close to the African or Malagasy coasts”, Météo-France specifies in its latest bulletin.

A significant deterioration in rainfall is expected

In the Comoros, heavy rain is expected during the day and in Mozambique, “even if the tendency is for the system to turn a little more to the center of the channel, it is a mature system that could approach the coasts of the province of Nampula” Monday, according to Météo-France. Heavy rains, strong winds and dangerous sea conditions with marine submersions are thus “possible”.

In the meantime, “significant rainy and windy deterioration” is “expected in the coming hours” in the Mayotte archipelago, which could generate flash floods, floods and landslides.

Gusts of up to 80 to 90 km/h are “possible”, particularly in the southern part of the island. A dangerous sea state, particularly on the western lagoon, could also accompany this deterioration with a risk of marine submersion.

Barge traffic (local ferries) has been stopped since Saturday 7:00 p.m. local time. Marcel-Henry International Airport closed its doors at 4:00 p.m. Saturday, until further notice.

“We are very worried”

Some 645 Civil Security personnel are pre-positioned in strategic locations in the archipelago to intervene as quickly as possible following the cyclone alert in order to “provide assistance, assess the damage and assist the population”, Civil Security indicated.

Overseas Minister Manuel Valls assured AFP that “nothing was left to chance” to ensure the safety of the Mahorais.

“We are very worried given what happened the first time”, Ali Ahmed, a resident of Mamoudzou, told an AFP correspondent on Saturday place.

Images broadcast on the TV channel Mayotte-La 1ère showed families stocking up in stores, particularly on packs of water. “We make sure we have everything at home”, Mohamed explained to the AFP correspondent on Saturday afternoon, before being confined.

Chido caused colossal damage, leaving at least 39 dead and more than 5,600 injured, destroying many precarious and permanent homes in the 101st French department.

Cyclones usually develop in the Indian Ocean from November to March. This year, surface waters are close to 30°C in the area, which provides more energy to storms, a global warming phenomenon also observed this fall in the North Atlantic and the Pacific.