Sunshine after wet Christmas |27 December 2005

“We expect the weather to continue clearing up, and we are not likely to see the kind of heavy precipitation we experienced during Christmas,” meteorologist Gerard Bijoux said.

“We are still in the rainy season, but it is not likely to shower as heavily as it did last weekend,” he said, when asked what Seychellois should expect during the New Year celebrations on Sunday, January 1, 2006.

He nevertheless added that it was a bit too early to predict the expected pattern with much precision.

He said that Bon Espoir, which had recorded 235mm of rain in the 24 hours that ended on Sunday at 7.00 a.m., had registered only 18mm by yesterday morning.

Anse Boileau, where flooding occurred on Christmas Day, had 208mm then, but only 88 had fallen by 7.00 a.m. yesterday.

The expected scenario is quite different from that of last Sunday when many Seychellois celebrated Christmas indoors amid warnings of possible flooding as torrential rains fell, raising fears of landslides similar to those that struck the islands merely hours after the tsunami hit the archipelago last year.

On Saturday, meteorologists issued “an advisory” but elevated it to a warning level I and later Level II, urging residents to watch their surroundings and evacuate if necessary.

“I have just updated the warning to Level II and extended its validity from noon to 4.00 p.m.,” meteorologist Francois Mondon said on Christmas day.

He said Mahe had received 100mm of rain on average but certain areas had precipitation exceeding 234mm, which he said was enough to trigger off landslides, but Praslin and neighbouring islands got only 15mm of rain.

“We elevated the advisory to warning Level I when the rainfall reached 120mm and to Level II when it exceeded 160mm,” he said.

He warned motorists to stay off certain roads which were prone to flooding as emergency teams were dispatched to areas around Pointe Larue where houses were expected to be hit only maintained a surveillance and did not effect any evacuations.

Kenya Airways Flight KQ450 from Nairobi was rerouted to Mombasa due to the bad weather, managing to land six hours late at 7.10 p.m.

Flight KQ 451 which would have departed at 2.00 p.m. on Sunday left yesterday at 10.55 a.m. after the aircraft’s crew had taken the mandatory rest required of them by international civil aviation regulations.