"Belal hit La Réunion hard but didn't cause the cataclysm we might have feared." Visibly relieved at a 7 pm briefing on Monday, January 15, the island's prefect, Jérôme Filippini, confirmed that "La Réunion is seeing the end of the tunnel."

Cyclone Belal is now moving away from the French Indian Ocean island department (population 860,000) and heading south-east. On Monday afternoon, the violent gusts of wind in the capital Saint-Denis, located in the northern part of the island, had significantly diminished in intensity. The torrential rains came to an end, giving way to a muggy, stifling and almost artificial heat.

Filippini indicated that Réunion would remain on red alert until Tuesday morning. This lockdown measure would be lifted once the roads had been made safe. Many stretches of road are currently obstructed by electric wires. "The impact on traffic routes has not been measured," the prefect said.

Réunion residents posted numerous photos on social media taken from their homes: Overflowing rivers churning with brown water; trees toppled over; sheet-metal roofs blown or ripped off; roads flooded or covered with mud, stones and vegetation. The first assessment of this tropical depression's passage reported the death of one homeless person: Local authorities were unable to confirm whether this man was a direct victim of Belal or of "his personal situation."

A total of 786 people have been admitted to shelters and 110 evacuated from their homes, mainly due to the risk of flooding.

At 7 pm on Monday, national electricity company EDF announced that 150,000 subscribers – i.e. a third of Réunion's population – had been left without electricity. Only one of the island's 24 municipalities escaped the power outages. More than 100,000 households have been left without running water due to the outages. 17% of cell phone relays are out of service, and 32% of users can no longer use their landline phones.

Due to disruptions to drinking water supply networks, the regional health agency has recommended drinking bottled water or tap water that has been boiled for three minutes.

To deal with the damage, the government has decided to send 100 civilian and military firefighters and 50 EDF technicians from Paris. They are due to arrive on Tuesday afternoon. Around 30 civil security firefighters based on the French island department of Mayotte are also due to arrive on Réunion Island. Roland-Garros airport is due to reopen at 6:30 pm on Tuesday, operating around the clock to make up for canceled flights while the island is currently on school vacations until Monday, January 22.

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