Madagascar braces for more powerful Cyclone Freddy after Cheneso kills 30 people

Two weeks after Tropical Cyclone Cheneso devastated Madagascar, killing 30 people, the Indian Ocean island nation and its neighbours are bracing for a more powerful Cyclone Freddy.

Two weeks after Tropical Cyclone Cheneso devastated Madagascar, killing 30 people, the Indian Ocean island nation and its neighbours are bracing for a more powerful Cyclone Freddy.

Meteo France has described Freddy as an “intense tropical cyclone” and a particularly powerful and compact tropical system, generating extreme winds near its centre. The much smaller islands of Mauritius and Reunion are on high alert as Freddy – churning westward on Friday about 2,000 kilometers east of Mauritius – was expected to cause flooding there Sunday and Monday.

In its latest briefing Friday afternoon, the United Nations regional weather observation center in Reunion said Freddy, which formed two weeks ago near Indonesia, was expected to make landfall early next week with the equivalent strength of a formidable category 5 hurricanes. Another cyclone, Dingani, was weakening.