Photos by Linny Folau

Tonga continues to brace itself for destructive winds expected from Tropical Cyclone Ula, for the next 12 hours. The eye of Ula passed 55km to the north of Vava’u at 6:00am this morning with the strongest wind gusts of 80 knots (about 160kph) recorded at 7:00am.

Director of Tonga’s National Emergency Management Office, Leveni ‘Aho, said  at 10:00 am that a couple of sheds were blown down in Vava'u, which is the closest to the centre of the storm, but no reports of major damage. "So far it's much better than our expectations."

“At this stage it's pretty light, we haven’t had any major infrastructure failure. We got a report of about two sheds taken down but the police are out on the road and our team are out there further assessing but at this stage it seems to be very light in terms of [damage].

"A few trees between the airport and Neiafu are down and our people are working with infrastructure team in trying to clear some of those ...we should get exact details in next few hours,” he said. “The wind was coming from the side where there is not much housing.”

He said communications were maintained with Vava'u throughout the height of the storm.

Precaution

As a precautionary measure a State of Emergency was advised by the NEMO Committee at about 10:00pm last night, he confirmed.

“The cyclone was moving straight toward Vava’u and the committee at the time thought it might develop into a Category 4 storm, so it was a precaution.”

The State of Emergency was declared by the Prime Minister on Radio Tonga at about 1:00am to run until 29 January but Leveni said it can be dissolved at any time.

“We should continue to brace ourselves for the next 12 hours and we are relying on the Met reports,” he said. NEMO has been on alert since Thursday.

Leveni said the power in Vava’u had been disrupted and was switched off last night, as a precaution. "They are trying to assess the situation before switching it back on for safety reasons.

“TCC telephones went out about 1 hour ago, but Digicel mobile services are still operating and we have not had to use our satellite phones,” he said.

There are no reports of damage from the airport runways.

In Ha’apai the power was still on, and he was not aware of any damage reports. "We maintained contact throughout the night and they said the wind was a little bit stronger but not to a stage where it did any damage or caused sea surge but we still have to be precautionary over the next day or two until this system is entirely out of our waters."

Observed gusts

'Ofa Fa'anunu, the Director of Tonga Met, said the centre never reached Vava'u. The strongest winds recorded in Vava'u this morning were 50 knots with gusts up to 80 knots (160kph) at 7:00am.

"The strongest winds in Ha'apai were recorded at 6:00 am this morning, 25 knots gusting to 40 knots (80kph)", said 'Ofa.

Tonga Met is continuing to monitor the storm and liaising with Paula Ma'u CEO of MEIDECC and Leveni 'Aho of NEMO and will issue further statements this afternoon. Paula said the National Emergency Management Committee had met five times, on Tropical Cyclone Ula and brings together all the major civil defence operators.