Around a hundred personnel and eight tonnes of equipment are leaving Reunion today to lend a hand to the relief efforts in Mayotte, on alert as Chido approaches. The tropical cyclone is expected Saturday morning as close as possible to the coast.
These are two planes which took off on Friday December 13 from Reunion, responsible for bringing human and material reinforcements to the island of Mayotte threatened by the imminent passage of intense tropical cyclone Chido.
Expected on Saturday morning on the north-eastern coasts of Grande Terre with winds between 120 and 150 km/h, the meteor should cause the island to go into red alert from 7 a.m. Saturday December 14.
Also, the Minister of the Interior and the zone prefect have decided to send reinforcements as a preventive measure from France and Reunion. A first commercial airliner, specially chartered, took off at 1 p.m. from Gillot airport.
On board, 35 firefighters from Reunion, including a canine team or specialists from the clearance rescue unit and health personnel, but also 70 soldiers from the 7th Civil Security Training and Intervention Regiment from Brignoles (Var).
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©Nina Santi
Also taking their place were executives from the Indian Ocean civil protection zone headquarters (EMZPCOI), as well as agents from the regional Health agency, EDF and Météo France.
At 3 p.m., the Civil Security Dash 8 was to take off from Pierrefonds airport, with four firefighters from SDIS 974 and eight tons of intervention equipment on board.
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©Olivier Murat
Substantial resources, while Mayotte has not experienced such an event for almost forty years. “A very rare event, you have to go back to the 80s to experience an episode of this magnitude in Mayotte”confirmed this morning the prefect's chief of staff, Vincent Bernard-Lafoucrière who came to greet and encourage the departing rescuers.
“We are moderately worried, but still quite worried about the potential impacts that this could have on the island and this fully justifies the anticipation that has been shown”he emphasized.
In Mayotte, where a large part of the population lives in precarious habitats, and where access to water and electricity can already be difficult in normal times, the damage caused by a cyclone could indeed prove very detrimental to the population.
“This is the second time this year that SDIS 974 has sent an aid detachment to Mayotte this year after the episode of drought and water crisis, we are applying regional solidarity”recalled Sophie Arzal, president of CASDIS.
The last weather update at 1 p.m. local time in Réunion placed Chido, still at the stage of an intense tropical cyclone 500 km northeast of the Mahoran coast, progressing towards the southwest at a speed of 22 km/h and starting to affect the weather conditions on the north of Madagascar.
