more than 200 dead in floods before the arrival of a cyclone

The death toll from floods since March in Kenya has exceeded 200 deaths, the Interior Ministry announced on Friday, as the country prepares for the arrival of a cyclone approaching the Tanzanian coast. Torrential rains hit many countries in East Africa, causing floods and landslides that destroyed crops, swept away homes, and displaced hundreds of thousands of people. At least 210 people have died in Kenya “due to severe weather conditions”, said the Ministry of the Interior in a press release. A previous report on Thursday reported 188 deaths.

More than 165,000 people have been displaced and 90 people are missing in the country. Kenya and neighboring Tanzania, where at least 155 people have been killed in similar floods, are also preparing for the arrival of a cyclone, synonymous with further heavy rains. Tanzanian authorities warned on Friday that the meteorological phenomenon called Hidaya “strengthened to reach full cyclone status” at 3 a.m. (00:00 GMT) when it was located some 400 km southeast of the town of Mtwara. “Cyclone Hidaya continued to strengthen, with winds reaching 130 km/h”they indicated in a weather report.

El Niño the catalyst

The Kenyan Interior Ministry estimates that the cyclone could bring strong winds, powerful waves and heavy rainfall from Sunday when it hits the coast. In Burundi, at least 29 people have died and 175 have been injured since the start of the rainy season in September, the UN Office of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said. Rainfall in the region has been amplified by El Niño, a natural climate phenomenon generally associated with global warming, which causes droughts in some parts of the world and heavy rains elsewhere.

By the end of 2023, torrential rains in Kenya, Somalia and Ethiopia had already caused the deaths of more than 300 people, in a region that was struggling to recover from the worst drought recorded in 40 years.