3 days Ago By ASSOCIATED PRESS
MAMOUDZOU, Mayotte — They clustered around water taps, rare sources of electricity and each other. Four days after the strongest cyclone in nearly a century ripped through the French island territory of Mayotte off the coast of Africa, survivors recalled the horror of the storm that caught many by surprise. Associated Press journalists reached the humid capital before dusk, as French military personnel and others rushed to clear fallen palm trees from roads ahead of French President Emmanuel Macron’s visit Thursday.
Streets were lined with the rubble of informal settlements whose migrant populations complicate the efforts to count the dead. “We lived something very apocalyptic,” said Samuel Anli, a 28-year-old local who rode out Saturday’s storm in a windowless office, where he huddled for hours as shrieking wind gusts exceeding 136 mph tore away doors and walls. He and others held the door to their small office shut, fearing for their lives French authorities described the storm Wednesday as a “catastrophe of exceptional intensity.
” “The island is devastated,” they said..
