Growing toll on French Mayotte from Cyclone Chido
Officials are warning of a humanitarian catastrophe unfolding on Mayotte after Tropical Cyclone Chido slammed into the French Indian Ocean territory on 14 December.
Images emerging from Mayotte show entire neighbourhoods of sheet-metal roofed homes in ruins after the storm hit with winds topping 220 km/h. The prefect for Mayotte, a French state official, has warned that there are “certainly several hundred” deaths, while a final toll could be in the thousands. Health services have been severely damaged.
Located part way between Mozambique and Madagascar, Mayotte has a large population of undocumented migrants. This can increase people’s vulnerability during and after disasters, and may make it more complicated to track casualties.
The majority of migrants on Mayotte are from nearby Comoros, which reportedly declared a week of national mourning. Cyclone Chido also made landfall in Mozambique, which began evacuations days earlier.
Chido’s heavy rains and winds are still expected to affect parts of northern Mozambique, Malawi, Zimbabwe, and Zambia. More than two million people live in the storm’s path between Mozambique and Malawi, according to the UN.
Climate change can supercharge extreme weather, making tropical cyclones more volatile. Chido was reportedly the worst storm to hit Mayotte in 90 years.
For more on Mayotte as a migration hub, read our archive of reporting from the capital, Mamoudzou, and on the 4,000-kilometre journey some have taken across the Indian Ocean:
Mayotte: the French migration frontline you’ve never heard of
Mayotte lures migrants with the hope of a better life, but those who survive the sea crossing live a precarious existence.
Sri Lanka's new asylum route: A 4,000-km journey across the Indian Ocean
Hardening borders in Asia and the Pacific are cracking open a migration path to La Réunion and Mayotte. But most asylum seekers are rejected before they can even apply.
