Watch: “The cyclone was devastating” – Daviz Simango

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Watch: “The cyclone was devastating” – Daviz Simango

6:13 CAT | 25 Jan 2021

Photo: Lusa

Mayor of Beira, Daviz Simango, this Saturday (23.01) called Cyclone Eloise “devastating” for the city on Mozambique’s central coast, and says some 200,000 people may be affected.

Simango said that the storm had caused flooding well before it actually reached the municipality, with half a million inhabitants one of Mozambique’s largest cities.

Even so, and despite the garbage accumulated in drainage ditches, “the runoff is working and the tide is low”, which will help to alleviate the most flooded areas.

In March 2019, Beira was hit by Cyclone Idai, which caused 603 deaths in Mozambique and was one of the biggest storms ever recorded in the southern hemisphere. In late 2020, the region was again affected, this time by the storm Chalane, which also brought heavy rains.

Surveying

A detailed survey of the damage is still ongoing, but it is clear that the cyclone “destroyed infrastructure, with many houses left roofless and walls collapsing” – causing at least two deaths in Inhamizua neighbourhood, the mayor said.

According to Simango, three other reported deaths turned out after investigation not to have been related to the storm.

The mayor of Beira said he did not yet have information about the Munhava neighbourhood, where two deaths from landslides and another caused by wind-borne material had been reported.

Ecos do Ciclone Eloise-Beira

Publicado por Conselho Municipal da Beira – CMB em Domingo, 24 de janeiro de 2021

National Institute for Disaster Management (INGD) director-general Luísa Meque said this Saturday (23-01) at the end of a meeting of the provincial emergency committee that nine wounded were confirmed, one seriously, but added that she had so far received only preliminary information, and that it was premature to advance definitive figures.

Work continues to restore normal electricity supply and telecommunications, she said

“We are maintaining our warnings”

The destructive winds may be at an end, but Daviz Simango nevertheless renewed calls for caution. “We continue to alert the population to the possibility of heavy rain” falling over the next few days, he said.

After making landfall from the Mozambique Channel in the Indian Ocean near the city of Beira at dawn, Cyclone Eloise lost intensity and regressed to the degree of moderate storm, though still with very heavy rain, and advanced through southern Zimbabwe.

The tropical depression is expected to dictate weather conditions over the next few days, bringing heavy rainfall to the south of the country, including the capital, Maputo.

The European Union’s Humanitarian and Relief Service (ECHO) has predicted that 200,000 people in central and southern Mozambique could be affected by flooding in the immediate future.

Source: Deutsche Welle / Conseho Municipal da Beira