At least four people have died as a result of Tropical Cyclone Freddy, which hit Madagascar tonight, according to the country’s National Office for Disaster Risk Management (BNGRC).
Bad weather accompanied by strong winds on the east coast killed “four people” on the large Indian Ocean island, affecting a total of 16,660 people, according to the latest BNGRC report.
Some 3,300 houses were flooded and nearly as many were damaged. More than 11,000 people were displaced, most of whom were transferred to emergency shelters as a precaution.
“Freddy brought less rain and the damage registered is almost exclusively related to the wind,” according to Faly Aritiana Fabien, from the BNGRC, in statements to Agence France-Presse.
The cyclone made landfall in the eastern part of the country, in the Mananjary region, Tuesday night around 16:30 GMT, and is now moving west. The coastal city of 25,000 was already largely destroyed last year by Cyclone Batsirai, which killed more than 135 people.
“The weakened system continues its path over the land mass of Madagascar,” with average winds reduced to 65 km/h, according to the French meteorological institute, Météo-France.
The cyclone had previously passed through Mauritius and Reunion Island, causing less damage than feared as it passed at high altitudes.
Madagascar, one of the world’s poorest countries, is being hit by extreme drought in a large area of the south, causing increasing numbers of people to suffer from acute malnutrition and widening pockets of hunger.
About ten storms or cyclones cross the southwestern Indian Ocean annually during the cyclone season, which runs from October to April.
Cyclone Freddy is expected to leave Madagascar tonight and hit Mozambique this Friday, already as a tropical storm, with heavy rains and minor winds, according to forecasts.
The Mozambican government decreed a red alert status on Tuesday to respond more quickly to the floods that are already affecting the country.
According to an updated balance this Tuesday, the number of deaths in the rainy season rose to 95, a total that already accounts for 11 deaths in the floods registered between February 7 and 20 in the south of the country.
These floods, which particularly affected the Maputo region, caused damage to 43,500 people, bringing the total affected since the start of the rainy season to 100,000.
Freddy is expected to hit the Mozambican provinces of Sofala and Inhambane overnight from Thursday to Friday and it is not yet known how hard the storm will hit the country, but it is expected to be a reduced intensity to a tropical storm, with heavy heavy rain . for Friday and the following days in the central-southern interior of Mozambique.
Source: TSF
