11 March 2008
Maputo — The number of known deaths from cyclone Jokwe's weekend passage across the northern Mozambican province of Nampula now stands at eight.
The latest information reaching Maputo indicates severe damage in the district of Mogovolas. According to Dulce Chilundo, of the press office of the National Emergency Operational Centre (CENOE), in the locality of Manhupo, one person died, two were injured, and 1,994 huses were damaged. Farmers lost a considerable amount of livestock: 508 of their animals are known to have died.
A second Mogovolas death occurred in the small town of Mutua, where the cyclone completely demolished 156 houses, and damaged a further 137. Here two churches and a mosque were also wrecked.
In the Mogovolas district capital of Nametil, a school, a church, a mosque and about 100 houses were destroyed.
Jokwe did not cause much damage in the neighbouring province of Zambezia, because its course took it back out to sea. It has moved slowly down the Mozambique Channel, generating waves eight metres high, and posing a significant threat to shipping.
On Tuesday morning it remained a powerful storm, and was bringing heavy rains and strong winds to the south-western coast of Madagascar. But Salvador Domingos, of the National Meteorology Institute (INAM), told reporters the possibility of a further change in direction could not be ruled out, bringing the cyclone back across the Channel, and affecting the coasts of the southern Mozambican provinces of Inhambane, Gaza and Maputo.
This is precisely what the trajectory of the storm, projected by the US Navy's Joint Typhoon Warning Centre, suggests that Jokwe will do. However, satellite images also indicate that the cyclone is now losing its cohesion, and so might dissipate over the next day or two.
Jokwe was causing winds of 150 kilometres an hour, with gusts of up to 185 kilometres an hour on Tuesday morning. But as the cyclone weakens the windspeed will fall: the prediction is that by early Thursday morning the speed of the winds will be down to 45 knots (83 kilometres an hour).
Mad/pf (351)
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