• Cyclone Chido’s death toll in Mayotte could reach thousands, with widespread devastation reported.
• Rescue efforts are hindered by damaged infrastructure and chronic water shortages.
• Medical supplies and personnel are being sent, but accurate casualty counts remain challenging.

A senior official said on Sunday the death toll from cyclone Chido’s passage across Mayotte would be in the hundreds, perhaps even thousands, as France rushed in rescue workers and supplies.

Their efforts are likely to be hindered by the damage to airports and electricity distribution in the French Indian Ocean territory.

Even before the cyclone’s passage, clean drinking water was subject to chronic shortages.

“I think there will definitely be several hundred, perhaps we will come close to a thousand or even several thousand” deaths, prefect Francois-Xavier Bieuville told broadcaster Mayotte la Premiere.

It would be “very difficult to reach a final count” given that most residents are Muslim, traditionally burying their dead within 24 hours, he said.

A previous toll shared with AFP by a security source had confirmed only 14 deaths.

On Sunday, Ambdilwahedou Soumaila, the mayor of Mayotte’s capital, Mamoudzou, said nine people were fighting for their lives in hospital, while another 246 had been seriously injured.

“The hospital is hit, the schools are hit. Houses are totally devastated,” he said. The storm had “spared nothing”, Soumaila said.

Establishing an accurate toll will be doubly difficult given France’s Interior Ministry estimates about 100,000 people live clandestinely on Mayotte.

Some of them did not dare to venture out and seek assistance, “fearing it would be a trap” designed to remove them from Mayotte, saidOusseniBalahachi, a former nurse.

Many had stayed put until the last minute when it proved too late to escape the cyclone, she said.

A house that was destroyed when Cyclone Chido hit France's Indian Ocean territory of Mayotte. Photo / AFP

Medical personnel and equipment were being delivered from Sunday by air and sea, said the prefecture in La Reunion, another French Indian Ocean territory some 1400km away on the other side of Madagascar.

A first aid plane landed in Mayotte about 3.30pm local time with three tonnes of medical supplies, blood for transfusions and 17 medical staff, authorities in La Reunion said, with two military aircraft expected to follow.

A navy patrol ship was also to depart La Reunion with personnel and equipment, including for electricity supplier EDF.

Mayotte’s 320,000 residents were ordered into lockdown on Saturday as Cyclone Chido bore down on the islands about 500km east of Mozambique, with gusts of at least 226km/h.

Electricity poles were hurled to the ground, trees uprooted and sheet-metal roofs and walls torn off the shantytown housing inhabited by at least one-third of the population.

Resident Ibrahim spoke of “apocalyptic scenes” as he made his way through the main island, having to clear blocked roads for himself.

Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau will travel to Mayotte on Monday, his office said, alongside 160 soldiers and firefighters to reinforce the 110 already deployed to the islands.

Pope Francis, visiting French Mediterranean island Corsica on Sunday, urged people to pray for Mayotte’s residents.

Just northwest of Mayotte, the Comoro Islands, some of which had been on red alert since Friday, were also hit, but suffered only minor damage.

Cyclone Chido later brought gale-force winds and heavy rain to Mozambique, making landfall early on Sunday about 40km south of the northern city of Pemba, weather services said.

It damaged buildings and knocked out power in some areas of Mozambique’s northern coastal provinces of Nampula and Cabo Delgado on Saturday, authorities said.

But by the afternoon Chido was travelling over the inland province of Niassa and had weakened, said the president of the National Institute for Risk and Disaster Management, Luisa Meque.

Unicef said it was on the ground to help the people hit by the storm.

“Many homes, schools and health facilities have been partially or completely destroyed and we are working closely with the government to ensure continuity of essential basic services,” it said.

Cyclone Chido is the latest in a string of storms worldwide fuelled by climate change, say experts.

The “exceptional” cyclone was supercharged by particularly warm Indian Ocean waters, meteorologist Francois Gourand of the Meteo France weather service said.

The United Nations Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said on Friday it was similar in strength to cyclones Gombe in 2022 and Freddy last year. They killed more than 60 people and at least 86 in Mozambique respectively.

OCHA warned about 1.7 million people were in danger, and said the remnants of the cyclone could also dump “significant rainfall” on neighbouring Malawi on Monday, potentially triggering flash floods.

Zimbabwe and Zambia were also expected to see heavy rain, it said.

- Agence France-Presse