Watch: Freddy’s approach causes flooding in Beira, cuts Sofala’s main road

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Watch: Freddy’s approach causes flooding in Beira, cuts Sofala’s main road

2:25 CAT | 23 Feb 2023

Screen grab: Miramar

Several suburbs of Beira are flooded and National Highway Number 6 (EN6) is cut off as a result of heavy rains falling since early on Wednesday (22-02).

The scenario results from the approach of Cyclone Freddy. The city of Beira, capital of the province of Sofala, is located in a swampy area below sea level, and is prone to flooding.

Some families, especially in the Manga, Vaz and Ndunda neighbourhoods, areas with a poor sanitation system, were yesterday already abandoning their homes for safe areas and accommodation centres.

“This rain is already making us worried, because it doesn’t stop. Our houses are already flooded; with the approach of cyclone Freddy the situation will be unbearable,” Felismina João says.

For Leonel Domingos, “the floods are making it difficult for people to walk around and have cut access roads, and may contribute to the proliferation of waterborne diseases”, in a city that has already registered four cases of cholera.

Road cut

National Highway Number 6, which connects the city of Beira to the rest of the country, is cut from the district of Dondo on.

“At the moment we are monitoring the situation. The waters have already receded a little, but can rise again at any moment. Traffic will be restored when the water level drops,” says Egídio Morais, provincial delegate of the National Roads Administration.

Cyclone Freddy is due to hit the Mozambican coast on Wednesday (22-02), affecting the provinces of Sofala, Zambézia and Inhambane.

The National Institute of Meteorology said that Cyclone Freddy had yesterday weakened to a tropical depression and was, on Wednesday, moving from Madagascar towards the Mozambique Channel at a speed of 30 km/h.

Freddy will gradually re-intensify until reaching the Mozambican coast as a tropical storm, bringing rainfall in excess of 200mm/24h and winds with gusts of up to 120 km/h to the districts of Machanga, Chibabava and Buzi in Sofala province.

In Inhambane province, ‘Freddy’ will affect the districts of Funhalouro, Mabote, Homoine, Morrumbene, Massinga, Vilankulo, Inhassoro, Govuro, Panda, and the cities of Maxixe and Inhambane.

Watch the Miramar report in Beira city, yesterday.

Source: Voa portugues