JOHANNESBURG, 18 February 2008 (IRIN) - Tropical cyclone "Ivan" made its way across the Indian Ocean and slammed into Madagascar's northeastern coast on Sunday, 18 February. The exact extent of the destruction is not yet known, but government and aid agencies fear the worst as the storm makes its way through some of the island's most heavily populated areas.

According to Dia Styvanley Soa, spokeswoman for the National Office for Natural Disasters Preparedness (BNGRC), "Nine people were crushed under the rubble of a hotel," and have been presumed dead, at least two other people were reported dead and thousands more have been affected.

Ivan, a category four cyclone - the scale only goes to five - while still over the sea, and winds of up to 210km per hour just before it hit, made its way across the island as a category three, slowly diminishing in strength to a tropical storm. Its expected trajectory has taken it just north of the capital, Antananarivo.

No figures but fear for the worst

"There are no figures yet. Assessment are underway but we expect extensive damage, initially because of the winds, and over the next few days because of flooding," Edouard Libeau, Emergency Specialist at the UN's Children Fund (UNICEF) in Madagascar, told IRIN while he was stranded in Madagascar's second city, Toamasina, in the east of the island, while trying to reach the affected areas.

"We are 100 kilometres [south] from where the eye of the cyclone landed. There are very strong winds, infrastructure has been damaged, bridges have been flooded and we cannot pass. Electric cables are broken, roofs have been ripped off, one out of every five electricity poles is down." He said schools and hospitals had also been severely damaged.

Libeau estimated that over two million Malagasy lived in the towns, cities and villages that had been in the path of the storm, though he expected fewer would have been directly affected.

According to the BNGRC's Soa, "Ivan passed though highly populated areas and there was lots of rain. Almost all the towns where Ivan has passed are flooded now. The level of rivers and the sea is rising, and in the capital there is also risk of floods."

A BNGRC team and helicopter were deployed to assess the situation on Monday. "Assessment is the priority now, to know exactly the extent of the damage. We know there is a need for food, for shelter, but we don't know for how many people," Soa said.

Ivan is now moving toward the Mozambique Channel. Across the channel, flood-drenched Mozambique, where over 200,000 people are still at risk from rising rivers, has been put on cyclone alert. Although the storm looks likely to continue dissipating, there are fears that the heavy rain associated with Ivan could bring further flooding.

Not the first time and certainly not the last

Madagascar has a history of devastating cyclone encounters: the previous one, Fame, in late January 2008, claimed 12 lives; in the 2007 cyclone season, the worst in living memory, six of these storms ravaged the island, killing over 150 people.

During 2006/07 there was unprecedented flooding in the centre and north of the country, with chronic drought in the south. The island nation faced an unusually difficult period and by the end of March 2007, the combined effects of the disasters had left nearly half a million people in need of humanitarian assistance.

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