PHOTOS: Cyclone Idai’s trail of destruction in Mozambique

As expected, Beira took a direct hit from cyclone Idai. Here are some photographs posted on social media, showing the devastation.

UPDATE: Heavy rain to enter Zim as cyclone Idai collapses

Mike Berridge report shared by Storm Report South Africa stated that there is a remarkable diminution of the cyclone Idai.

“It has now once again become a tropical depression with winds scarcely reaching 25 knots (46,3 km/h). This collapse has come at a hard price for central Mozambique where the full force of the wind has been reduced by it’s impact against the land. The affected areas will by this day’s end have only light showers in a 25 knot easterly wind.

But the remaining depression “LA” contains much heavy rain. It will cross the highlands of the province of Manica to the eastern escarpment of Zimbabwe.

Yellow shading shows the heavy rain areas. The purple arrow shows the depression will continue to move slowly westwards carrying heavy rain into central Zimbabwe. The ‘fuel’ for this pressure system (including the ex-cyclone) lies with the frontal zone marked ITCZ shown with a dotted green line.

This is bringing very humid unstable air from the Equatorial regions and when this meets air masses that have come from the south, great instability and rainfall result – often leading to tropical disturbances and cyclones. This is common in the mid Indian Ocean where there are no land obstructions to interfere with the confluence.

Winds blowing into the depression from the south will carry some cloud and light showers for most of southern Mozambique, north-east KZN, and east Limpopo.
Rain is once again brewing in the Cape Province. This is fairly similar to last week’s Low “LB” but is more stable. A dotted line shows the primary convergence zone where showers or thunder storms are expected.

The prospective rain areas are given pink shading, and extend to part of the south coast roughly between Mossel Bay and Port Elizabeth where thunder is possible in the morning.

The extent of the damage is unknown at this stage. Apparently the electricity and signal is out. Beira took a direct hit last night and devastation is expected.”

22:00

MBOMBELA – According to Storm Report South Africa, cyclone Idai is expected to make landfall within the next hour.

It has not lost any of its intesity and is likely to hit as an intense category 3 cyclone.

Idai is moving at 11 km/h and is expected to cause excessive floods.

The cyclone’s outer bands are littered with severe supercells with echo hooks indicating tornadoes on top of the dangerous gusts that could reach 250 km/h.

Winds have already caused severe damage to Beira.

Some models suggest that it will move further south west into Africa in the next few days, before heading back to the Mozambican channel.

12:00

MBOMBELA – Mike Berridge report shared by Storm Report South Africa stated that cyclone Idai will makes landfall today in the provinces of Sofala and Zambezia in central Mozambique a little north of the port of Beira.

The strongest winds, and storm surge on the coast, will inconveniently occur during the night after the wind and torrential rain has been gradually increasing throughout today.

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The maximum sustained winds (excluding random gusts which will be stronger) should be around 40 – 60 knots depending on the topography (lie of the land).

Tomorrow morning (Friday) the winds will quickly abate when the storm collapses due to the frictional drag of the land. But the torrential rains will continue and move westward into the neighboring province of Manica.

There the winds are not likely to exceed the ordinary gale force 35 knots. The next ‘port of call’ will be the east escarpment of Zimbabwe.

Fortunately, the storm has a small diameter, and even more fortunately is not able to track up or down the coast at full force.

It will be over quickly, but the main problem is going to be the flooding from the excessive amount of rain which won’t cease with the demise of the storm, but will be maintained by very humid Equatorial air continuing to flow in from the north.

06:57

MBOMBELA – Storm Report South Africa reported this morning that Idai is once again an extremely dangerous cyclone.

They described the cyclone has having a “well defined eye and extremely favourable conditions for further intensification.”

ALSO READ: South African emergency services on way as Cyclone Idai nears Mozambique

Less than an hour ago Idai was travelling at a speed of 11 kilometers  per hour with sustained winds of 195 kilometers  per hour and gusting at 240 kilometers per hour.

Waves of 12 meters and storm surge of 1.9 meters is an indication of what can be expected when Idai reaches landfall.

ALSO READ: Evacuation plans for certain areas in Moz due to Cyclone Idai