Daily Local News (West Chester, PA)
African coast set for ‘dangerous’ Cyclone Freddy
A cyclone which was intensifying as it approached the southeastern African coast has been labeled as “dangerous” by the United Nation’s weather agency on Monday as nations braced for landfall.
Cyclone Freddy was projected to reach Madagascar this evening and hurtle toward Mozambique by the end of the week. The tropical cyclone was equivalent to a Category 4 hurricane and was expected to dump heavy rain and bring turbulent winds.
A “significant deterioration in weather conditions” was underway, Meteo France’s multi-hazard early warning system predicted Monday. The weather agency said the cyclone was passing around 60 miles away from the islands of Mauritius then Reunion on Monday, where strong winds and dangerous seas were expected.
The regional weather observation center on the island of Reunion said that Freddy was rushing across the ocean with average wind speeds of 127 mph.
It is feared that up to 2.2 million people, mostly in Madagascar, will be impacted by storm surges and flooding, according to the Global Disaster Alert and Coordination System. The Mahanoro, Mananjary and Nosy Varita communes in western Madagascar were to be first-hit today.
Mozambique will likely be struck on Friday, according to the country’s national meteorology institute. The nation has already experienced widespread flooding in recent weeks, raising fears from the U.N. humanitarian agency that the “severe humanitarian situation in the region” may escalate.
Some five other coastal nations — Botswana, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Eswatini and South Africa — are also vulnerable as Freddy looks set to tear across the Mozambican channel after Wednesday, according to the region’s climate service center.
Last year, scientists were able to show that climate change worsened cyclones in southeast Africa, already a hotspot for tropical storms and cyclones.