(CNN) — Aid agencies in Bangladesh and Myanmar say they are bracing for a disaster and have launched a massive contingency plan as a powerful cyclone sweeps millions of vulnerable people.
Cyclone Mocha, which formed in the Bay of Bengal early Thursday, has been strengthening rapidly over the past 24 hours and is now equivalent to a Category 3 Atlantic hurricane, according to the Joint Typhoon Warning Center.
The storm is expected to intensify before making landfall on Sunday between Kyaukpyu in Myanmar’s western Rakhine state and Cox’s Bazar in southeastern Bangladesh, home to the world’s largest refugee camp, bringing with it destructive winds, heavy rain and the risk of storm surges brings with it.
According to Sanjeev Kafley, IFRC’s head of delegation, disaster response teams and more than 3,000 local volunteers trained in disaster preparedness and first aid have been placed on standby in the camps, and there is a national cyclone early warning system Bangladesh delegation.
Kafley said 7,500 shelters, 4,000 hygiene kits and 2,000 water containers are ready for distribution.
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Cyclone Mocha intensifies over the Bay of Bengal.
In addition, mobile health teams and dozens of ambulances are standing by to help refugees and Bangladeshis in need, with specially trained teams standing by to help the elderly, children and the disabled, Arjun Jain, UN chief coordinator for Rohingya refugee assistance in Bangladesh, said CNN.
“We anticipate that this cyclone will have a more severe impact than any other natural disaster they have faced in the past five years,” Jain said. “At this point, we simply do not know where and with what intensity the cyclone will make landfall. So we hope for the best but prepare for the worst.”
He said evacuation of people in low-lying areas or people with serious illnesses had started.
In Myanmar, residents of coastal Rakhine state and the Ayeyarwady region have started evacuating and are taking shelter in schools and monasteries.
Hundreds of Red Cross volunteers are on standby and the agency is in the process of relocating vulnerable people and raising awareness of the storm in villages and communities, said IFRC’s Kafley.
India’s Meteorological Office said Mocha was developing into an extremely severe cyclone on Saturday and forecast a storm surge of up to 2.5 meters (8.2 feet) is likely to inundate low-lying coastal areas in the cyclone’s path by the time of landfall .
About a million members of the stateless Rohingya community who fled persecution in nearby Myanmar during a military crackdown in 2017 live in the sprawling and overcrowded camps in Cox’s Bazar.
Most live in bamboo and tarpaulin shelters on hilly slopes exposed to high winds, rain and landslides.
Jain said the shelters could only withstand winds of 40 km/h (24 mph) and he expects wind speeds from Cyclone Mocha to exceed that speed.
“Animal lying areas of the camps are likely to be flooded quickly, destroying shelters, facilities such as learning centers and infrastructure such as bridges made of bamboo,” he said.
The cyclone adds to an already disastrous year for the Rohingya, and without more funding from the international community, Jain said they would not have enough to rebuild.
“Earlier in the year they suffered a 17% cut in their food rations due to funding cuts and we expect a further cut in their rations in the coming months. 16,000 refugees lost their homes in a devastating fire in March. And now they have to deal with the cyclone. Unfortunately, we don’t even have the resources to help refugees rebuild their homes and facilities when the destruction is severe,” he said.
There are also concerns about the 30,000 Rohingya refugees being housed on an isolated and flood-prone island complex called Bhasan Char in the Bay of Bengal. The UN refugee agency said volunteers and medical teams were on standby and cyclone shelters and food were available for residents of the island.
According to the UN Humanitarian Aid Organization, about 6 million people in Rakhine State and across the northwest of Myanmar are in need of humanitarian assistance, and 1.2 million are displaced.
Tropical cyclones have increased in strength in recent decades, battering countries in parts of Asia, and recent research suggests they could double their destructive power in the region by the end of the century.
While scientists are still trying to understand how climate change affects hurricanes, a body of research has linked human-caused global warming to stronger and more destructive hurricanes.
Tropical cyclones (also known as hurricanes, typhoons, and tropical storms, depending on sea basin and intensity) feed on ocean heat. They need temperatures of at least about 27 degrees Celsius to form, and the warmer the sea, the more moisture they can absorb.
Waters in the Bay of Bengal are currently about 30 degrees Celsius (86 degrees Fahrenheit), about 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than the May average.
As the climate crisis drives up ocean temperatures – which absorb around 90% of the world’s excess heat – it provides ideal conditions for cyclone strength.
According to recent research, warmer oceans also increase the likelihood that cyclones will intensify rapidly.
Sea level rise caused by climate change increases risks by exacerbating tropical cyclone storm surges and allowing them to spread further inland.
Bangladesh and Myanmar are particularly at risk because they are low-lying and home to some of the world’s poorest people.