INAM: Tropical Storm Chenge poses no threat to Mozambique’s coast or mainland

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INAM: Tropical Storm Chenge poses no threat to Mozambique’s coast or mainland

2:53 CAT | 20 Oct 2025

Image: @jnmet/X

A tropical depression forming off Madagascar has evolved into a moderate tropical storm, designated Chenge, the Mozambican National Institute of Meteorology (INAM) announced today, warning that it could reach the Mozambique Channel on October 25th.

According to INAM’s tropical cyclone monitoring information, Chenge is located in the southwestern Indian Ocean basin and “has the potential to reach the Mozambique Channel in the low-pressure stage on October 25”, but, for now, it poses no threat to the Mozambican coast or mainland.

Mozambique is considered one of the countries most severely affected by climate change, experiencing cyclical floods and tropical cyclones during the rainy season, which runs annually between October and April.

Between December 2025 and March 2026 alone, during the last rainy season, Mozambique was hit by three cyclones, including Chido, the first and most severe, at the end of 2024, which recorded nearly 200 deaths.

The number of cyclones hitting the country “has been increasing over the last decade”, as has the intensity of the winds, warns the INAM 2024 Climate Status report, released in March.

Extreme weather events caused at least 1,016 deaths in Mozambique between 2019 and 2023, affecting approximately 4.9 million people, according to data from the National Institute of Statistics.

The Mozambican government approved the contingency plan for the 2025/2026 rainy season on October 14, which admits it could affect 1.2 million people but has less than half of the 14 billion meticais (€190 million) required.

“Of what we have available, in terms of capacity to deal with this, we are talking about around six billion meticais [€81.4 million], which is a portion of what was calculated as necessary for this year. It is available in resources, equipment, and some cash,” said the spokesperson for the Council of Ministers, Inocêncio Impissa.

The plan, Impissa acknowledged, has “a deficit of eight billion meticais [€108.6 million], which is expected to be reduced through other sources of financing, such as parametric insurance, implementation of anticipatory measures for drought, floods, and cyclones, and donations in kind or cash”.

The rainy season in Mozambique began this month and continues until April. The Council of Ministers approved the contingency plan, which allows for three scenarios, potentially affecting from less than one million to four million Mozambicans. However, the government is working with a more realistic scenario of consequences for approximately 1.2 million people, in the intermediate forecast.

On September 12, Mozambican authorities warned of “high-magnitude” floods in the country and flooding of at least four million hectares of agricultural land during the current rainy season, which began in October.

Moderate TS #Chenge is southwest of #DiegoGarcia & is moving west. The storm can bring some rain to N #Madagascar or #Seychelles around Friday or Saturday. Watching a tropical low off #Indonesia for possible strengthening later this week. pic.twitter.com/BQXK5j44lD

— Jason Nicholls 💙 (@jnmet) October 20, 2025

Moderate Tropical Storm #Chenge is located west-southwest of #DiegoGarcia and is moving westward. The storm could bring rain and wind to northern #Madagascar later Friday and Saturday, and pic.twitter.com/hqC7tZhqZN

— Jason Nicholls 💙 (@jnmet) October 19, 2025