Faizel Patel – 23/01/2021
As tropical cyclone Eloise made landfall in Beira in Mozambique on Saturday morning, the South African Weather Service has issued an alert level nine for Mpumalanga and Limpopo warning of possible disruptive rain and widespread flooding.
The Mozambican government is evacuating residents to keep them out of the path of the storm.
Meanwhile, Mpumalanga, KZN and Limpopo are intensifying their efforts to mitigate and possible disruption when the storm spills over from Mozambique this weekend while KZN officials say they are currently meeting and will communicate a plan of action later in the day.
In a statement, the SA Weather Service says the weather conditions are expected to continue into Monday.
It says while Eloise would lose strength as it moved across land, it could leave behind a trail of destruction.
“As a landfalling Tropical Cyclone, one can expect “very destructive” winds, of the order of 118 to 166 km/h to affect the Beira area at landfall. Typically, given the clockwise rotation of surface winds around such a system together with the movement of the system, one can typically expect the strongest destructive winds to be located on the south-western quadrant of the system.”
The Weather Service says although the heaviest rains are expected during Sunday and Monday, there will still be some rain on Tuesday and Wednesday, albeit much lighter, which can result in further flooding.
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