UPDATE: CYCLONE GAMANE KILLS 11 IN MADAGASCAR

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Eleven people have died in Madagascar as a result of a slow-moving cyclone that turned unexpectedly towards the island nation. Authorities there reported that strong winds toppled trees and that rushing water washed away houses in villages.

The BNGRC national disaster management office announced on Thursday morning that cyclone Gamane, which was originally predicted to skim the island in the Indian Ocean east of southern Africa, altered its path and made landfall in the north on Wednesday.

About 7,000 people on the island were impacted by the storm, according to officials, who also stated that six people had drowned and five more had died as a result of houses coming down or trees falling.

The cyclone’s slow motion increased the extent of its destructive power.

Video images showed torrents of water rushing through villages and people making human chains in waist-deep water trying to help those trapped in their houses escape the deluge.

Numerous routes and bridges were flooded and cut off.

“It’s rare to have a cyclone like this. Its movement is nearly stationary,” General Elack Andriakaja, director general of the BNRGC, told AFP.

“When the system stops in one place, it devastates all the infrastructure. And that has serious consequences for the population. And significant flooding”, he added.

According to him, the low pressure system was supposed to “graze the northeast coast of Madagascar, but it is a natural phenomenon, and there was a change in trajectory.” On Wednesday, at 5:45 a.m., “it finally came to hit the Vohemar district.”

Meteorologists have reclassified Gamane as a tropical storm and predicted that it would depart the island on Friday afternoon.

About a dozen storms occur annually during the cyclone season in the southwestern Indian Ocean, which typically lasts from November to April.

AFP