Mozambique floods death toll approaches 300 as rescue continues

Updated 1:30 p.m. ET, March 22, 2019

The death toll from Mozambique’s worst flooding in almost two decades climbed to 293, as the government asked for international assistance a week after Cyclone Idai struck the southern African nation.

At least 139 others have died in neighboring Zimbabwe after the storm tore through the two southern African nations a week ago, according to the official count.

90,000 rescued

Floodwaters continued to linger over hundreds of square kilometers of central Mozambique, as rescuers used helicopters and boats to save people stranded in trees and on rooftops. Almost 90,000 people have been saved, the National Institute of Disaster Management said in a statement.

Beira, the Mozambican port city home to more than 500,000 people that bore the brunt of the cyclone, has been cut off by road, causing shortages of food and water.

“In Beira city, food prices have reportedly risen by about 300 percent, with long queues observed for staples such as bread and fuel,” the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said in a statement. “The city remains without electricity, while telephone and internet communication is intermittent.”

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Updated March 20, 2019

Rescue workers raced to pluck Mozambicans from trees and rooftops as floodwaters that have killed hundreds in the region continue to rise.

Tropical Cyclone Idai has deluged Mozambique and neighboring Zimbabwe with rain since last week, killing at least 300 people and leaving thousands stranded as rising waters cut off entire communities. Mozambique declared a state of emergency on Tuesday as the death toll in the country more than doubled to 202 and is expected to climb further.

Downpours continue

Downpours continue to hamper rescue efforts, said Caroline Haga, a spokeswoman for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. On Wednesday, aircraft operating from the international rescue coordination center at the airport in Beira, the coastal city that bore the brunt of Idai, were temporarily grounded because of bad weather.

“We are looking at a severe humanitarian emergency here that is affecting thousands and thousands of people. It’s so much more severe than we were expecting,” Haga said in an interview. “These people are now trapped in trees and on rooftops of buildings.”

The floods are similar to what Mozambique experienced when Cyclone Leon-Eline struck in 2000 and about 800 people died. President Filipe Nyusi said the death toll from this month’s floods could rise to 1,000 in his country alone. That would make it the third most deadly floods in Africa on record, according to data from the Brussels-based International Disaster Database.

Flooding over 152 square miles

The storm caused flooding over an area of 394 square kilometers (152 square miles), according to European Union satellite imagery. At least 1.5 million people have been affected, the United Nations said.

Damaged infrastructure has hindered rescue efforts as well. The storm destroyed roads and bridges in central Mozambique and eastern Zimbabwe, while high waters have made others impassable. Communications networks and electricity have been cut over large areas.

Before Idai became a tropical cyclone, it had already caused flooding and more than 70 deaths in Mozambique and neighboring Malawi earlier this month.

Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi are among the world’s poorest countries, and many of those affected by the flooding are smallholder farmers who were about to harvest their corn crops. Much of the region had suffered a drought before the floods.

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Originally published March 18, 2019

A tropical cyclone that swept across Mozambique at the weekend may have killed more than 1,000 people, President Filipe Nyusi said as heavy rains continued to pound neighboring Zimbabwe where flooding left dozens more dead.

“It’s clear that the next few days could be worse,” Nyusi said in comments broadcast on state radio. “If more than 1,000 lives have been lost, we won’t be surprised.”

‘Massive and horrifying’ damage

The death toll has risen sharply since Tropical Cyclone Idai made landfall almost directly over the Mozambican port city of Beira on Friday, knocking out communications networks and power plants before moving westward to Zimbabwe. The scale of the damage wrought by the storm is “massive and horrifying,” said Jamie LeSueur, who is leading an International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent assessment team in Beira.

“It seems that 90 percent of the area is completely destroyed,” he said in a statement.

Eskom Holdings SOC Ltd., the state-owned power utility in neighboring South Africa, said the storm reduced the amount of electricity it imports from the Mozambique’s Cahora Bassa hydropower dam, exacerbating a shortage that’s resulted in blackouts.

Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa cut short a visit to the United Arab Emirates to manage the government’s response to the disaster, the state-owned Herald newspaper reported. Nyusi also ended a trip to neighboring Eswatini ahead of schedule to tour some of the worst-hit areas in central parts of the country.

Heavy rains forecast to continue

Heavy rains are forecast to continue into the middle of the week, bringing more flooding and making it difficult to reach stranded communities in both Mozambique and Zimbabwe.

“We hope that the weather will improve, but right now we only have one helicopter on the ground which is operating in the area due to bad weather,” Joshua Sacco, a Zimbabwean lawmaker for Chimanimani East, one of the worst-affected areas, said by phone. “Unfortunately indications are that the death toll will increase. It’s not looking good at all.”

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