Cyclone Chapala approaching Oman coast

“OCHA and United Nations agencies are monitoring, planning and pre-positioning relief in preparation for the landfall of the storm”, United Nations spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric told reporters in New York.

In al-Mahra, Yemen’s easternmost province, security officials said dark clouds are forming amid unusually strong winds, though no damage has been reported yet.

On Monday, the World Meteorological Organization reported that the “extremely severe cyclonic storm” should hit al Mukalla overnight, “bringing intense rainfall to an arid area with no experience or infrastructure to cope with tropical cyclones”.

The island is home to about 50,000 people who speak their own language; many earn their living from fishing.

Omani authorities reduced the state of alert on Monday, saying the cyclone has moved westward towards Yemen and will have no direct effect on the sultanate.

At least two people killed as rare storm, Cyclone Chapala, destroys homes and forces evacuations on Socotra island.

Cars were submerged on city streets and seafront roads were badly damaged in the regional capital Mukalla, which has a population of about 300,000 and has largely been ruled by al Qaeda affiliates since April. Worse for the residents of Yemen than the winds were the rains brought by the cyclone; by a few estimates, Cyclone Chapala could bring as much as 20 to 30 inches of rain to the region.

Tropical Cyclone Chapala slammed into Yemen’s central coast early Tuesday, lashing the area with maximum sustained winds of around 140 kph (85 mph).

It said satellite images have shown that Chapala was approaching the shores with wind speeds between 220 and 250 kilometres (136 and 155 miles) per hour.

Socotra island is less than 250km from the Horn of Africa and 350km off the Yemeni mainland. Bob Henson of Weather Underground said it “is hard to overstate the rarity and gravity of this event: a hurricane-strength storm striking near a large, ancient city, situated near mountains, with no modern experience in dealing with tropical cyclones”. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s tropical database, the last time a hurricane-equivalent cyclone came this close to Socotra was in 1922.