Cyclone Harold ripped through Vanuatu for a second straight day on Tuesday, cutting off communications in some areas and complicating the Pacific nation's efforts to respond to the coronavirus pandemic. The Category 5 cyclone made landfall on Monday on an island north of the capital, Port Vila. It cut off "many areas" of the country's northern provinces, authorities said. It was later downgraded to a Category 4 storm.
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No deaths had been reported as of late Tuesday afternoon, but early photos of the storm's devastation showed villages where thatch roofs had been damaged or blown away entirely, raising fears.
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Last week, as Harold churned through the nearby Solomon Islands, passengers were washed from a ferry as they tried to make a dangerous journey through normally calm seas. Dozens are still missing and feared dead. Harold was moving eastward toward Fiji on Tuesday afternoon as a Category 4 storm, the Meteorology and Geo-hazards Division said. The agency estimated that the storm was churning along with maximum wind speeds of about 115 mph, and it advised residents to take extra precautions until the storm had completely left Vanuatu's waters.
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Flooding in Lamen Bay, about halfway between Port Vila and Luganville in the north, after Tropical Cyclone Harold swept through the northern islands of the Pacific island country. |The powerful cyclone complicates travel restrictions and social distancing measures that had been instituted in both countries to slow the spread of the coronavirus. That includes a virtual lockdown in Fiji and a ban on travel between Vanuatu's 83 islands.
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A day before the storm hit Port Vila.| Vanuatu, which has a population of about 300,000 people, is among the few countries in the world with none of either.
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Cyclone Harold ripped through Vanuatu for a second straight day on Tuesday, cutting off communications in some areas
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