Tourists and citizens on the Cook Islands in the South Pacific headed for emergency centres and high ground on Sunday as Cyclone Meena bore down on them packing winds gusting to 255kph, officials said.
An alert from the Fiji weather centre warned of ”very destructive hurricane-force winds” and ”phenomenal seas” with waves up to 11m high striking areas round the main island of Rarotonga and nearby Manaia by early on Monday.
”It doesn’t look very good for us” right now, said John Strickland, speaking from the nation’s National Emergency Operations Centre in the Cooks’ capital, Rarotonga.
He said people were securing their homes on all the islands in the path of Meena, while on Rarotonga seven hurricane centres had been opened and people were moving to higher ground inland to take shelter.
About 12 000 of the nation’s 20 000 citizens live on Rarotonga, while the smaller island of Aitutaki, currently in the path of the cyclone, has 2 000 to 3 000 permanent residents.
Strickland said the most destructive recent cyclone to hit the Cooks was Cyclone Sally in 1987, and ”we were pretty much devastated”, with the airport, beach hotels, tourist resorts and businesses in towns close to the sea front badly damaged.
”Cyclone Meena, we’re told, has twice the strength of Cyclone Sally,” Strickland said, adding: ”We’re hoping that it will swing out, [go] elsewhere,” he said.
The Aitutaki Lagoon Resort on the island of Aitutaki, 80km north of Rarotonga, said about 300 tourists have been evacuated to Rarotonga over the past two days, ahead of the cyclone.
Resort acting manager Patrick Moland said winds at the island are ”already picking up … and the seas are picking up as well”.
He said island residents are calm as they secure their properties ahead of the cyclone, expected to hit the island on Sunday night.
”They’ve been through a couple [of cyclones] before, so they’re not panicking or anything. They’re just going on about their business and securing their houses,” he told national radio. — Sapa-AP