Cyclone creates ‘inland ocean’
MAPUTO, Mozambique — Rescue workers struggled Tuesday to reach areas devastated by a huge cyclone in Mozambique, as heavy rains swelled rivers and further isolated flooded communities in what aid agencies called the worst natural disaster in southern Africa in two decades.
In central Mozambique, the area hit hardest by Cyclone Idai, overflowing rivers created “an inland ocean” where countless people were still marooned, a United Nations official said.
Rescue workers reported seeing people on rooftops and in trees days after the storm struck. In areas near the rivers, homes were submerged, with water rising near the tops of telephone poles.
More than 350 people have been confirmed dead, with hundreds missing and thousands more at risk. Until isolated communities are reached, relief workers said, it is impossible to estimate the number of casualties, though President Filipe Nyusi said Monday that the death toll could climb to more than 1,000.
At least 400,000 people were left homeless.
“We took an aerial survey, and as far as the eye can see, there was flooding, and deep as well,” said Jamie Lesueur, who was leading rescue efforts in central Mozambique for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. “What we are now facing is large-scale flooding on top of an area already devastated by the cyclone.”
The storm swept across Mozambique on Thursday night before turning inland into neighboring Malawi and Zimbabwe. It is believed to have affected more than 1.5 million people in the three nations.
The countries, among the world’s poorest, have limited capacity to respond to the disaster, and officials called for outside help. Relief officials warned that delays in reaching survivors could lead to an outbreak of illnesses, including cholera and malaria.
“This cyclone has come at a very huge human cost,” Nick Mangwana, a spokesman for the Zimbabwean government, said on Twitter. “We certainly need a regional approach to these effects of global warming. These problems are transnational.”
In Mozambique, several aid agencies focused their efforts on Beira, a port city of half a million people that was all but destroyed by the storm. A cargo plane loaded with emergency supplies was able to land at the airport there, but aid groups struggled to distribute the goods to affected areas.
The main highway into the city remained impassable, while secondary roads were being cleared of fallen trees and other debris, said Saul Butters, CARE’S assistant director for Mozambique.
Butters said the agency was now organizing airlifts by helicopter.
In Zimbabwe, the death toll was 98 but expected to rise, a local government minister, July Moyo, said. He said bodies of Zimbabweans had been reported floating all the way into Mozambique.
Malawi's government confirmed 56 deaths, three missing and 577 injured.
The United Nations allocated $20 million from its emergency response fund to ramp up the humanitarian response in Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi.