Image: Zoom Earth
The first ‘named’ storm of 2022 – Tropical Storm Ana – is wreaking havoc in the West Indian Ocean region, but will it affect South Africa?
As of Tuesday morning, Tropical Storm Ana is on a path through the Zomba, Mulanje and Phalombe districts in Zambia.
The South African Weather Service (Saws) said in a statement the storm “began rapidly intensifying over the open ocean to the north-east of Madagascar, northwards of Mauritius and the Reunion Islands”.
The storm waned in intensity over the weekend as it “swirled gradually from east to west over the central and northern Madagascar”, Saws said.
The loss in intensity was mainly due to surface friction within the landmass, “as well as the absence of the release of latent heat energy from the ocean surface”.
However, Tropical Storm Ana intensified on Sunday when it moved towards the tropical waters of the Mozambique channel.
The system continued to intensify overnight and was classified as a moderate tropical storm on Monday when it was given the name ‘Ana’.
As of 8am on Tuesday, Ana made landfall in Malawi.
This would bring with it the risk of torrential downpours and localised flooding.
Saws warned the storm “has the potential to cause significant wind damage to coastal infrastructure along the Mozambican north coast”.
At the time of publishing, Ana doesn’t pose a threat to South Africa as it will continue on a westward path and move towards lake Kariba over the coming days
Saws’ Kevin Rae said they will continue to monitor developments and issue updates when necessary.
Did you know the list of names for tropical storms are compiled ahead of time, and South Africa (a member of the WMO Regional Area) contributes names to this list?
Some of the unused names for 2021 include Cliff, Dumako, Fezile, Gombe, Karim, Oscar, Uyapo, Zanele and Walter.
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