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The French Overseas Department of Mayotte has been again hit by a cyclone a month after being battered by another.
Cyclone Dikeledi has flooded Mayotte, a month after Chido. “Mayotte is still affected by heavy rains, gusts of wind and risks of marine submersion. The event is ongoing and will continue into the afternoon. The few localized lulls are only temporary; the danger to the population persists,” the Office of the Prefect of Mayotte noted in a post on X on January 12, 2025.
“Vigilance must remain high and outings are prohibited. The population must remain confined indoors,” the post added.
“Passage of DIKELEDI closest to our island at 1 p.m. local time at just under 100 km. At 3 p.m. local time, this system evolving into a strong tropical storm was moving towards the west-southwest at 35 km/h while moving away from Mayotte towards the Mozambican coast,” Meteo France Mayotte, the official French weather forecaster, noted in a bulletin on its website at 6 pm local time on January 12, 2025.
The agency’s forecast for the night of January 12 states: “During the night, the sky remains overcast with clouds that can locally produce showers, sometimes with a stormy character. The wind is blowing at 40 to 50 km/h from the northwest with gusts of 60 km/h.”
Dikeledi, made landfall in northern Madagascar on January 11, killing at least three people, the BBC reported.
Cyclone Chido, which had struck Mayotte on December 14, was the worst storm to hit the archipelago in 90 years. A total of 39 people were killed by Chido in Mayotte. The storm went on to cause the deaths of 120 people in Mozambique, where Dikeledi is heading to.