MET Department reiterates public advice to stay indoors during thunderstorms anticipated in December

Public advised to be wary of thunderstorms 

By Duncan Mlanjira

The Department of Climate Change & Meteorological Services says most areas of the country are expected to experience thunderstorms accompanied by strong winds and lighting during the rest of the month of December.

Thus, the MET Department reiterates its advice to the general public “to take precautionary measures such as being indoors whenever thunderstorms occur within vicinity so as to avoid being struck by lightning or being harmed by flying objects blown off by gusty winds associated with the thunderstorms”.

The MET Services also asks city, town, road authorities and the public to clear debris in the storm-water drainage systems of roads to ease flow of storm-water runoff during a heavy rainfall.

“The public is further advised to religiously pay undivided attention to the continuously available daily, 10-day and weekly weather updates from the Department of Climate Change & Meteorological Services to be kept safe from any weather-related threats,” says the statement issued on Sunday, December 12.

It said as from Sunday to the next on December 16, most areas of the South, Centre and North are expected to continue experiencing hot to very hot, scorching and dry weather conditions.

“However, very few places — mostly over highlands and lakeshore areas — are expected to experience isolated thunderstorms due to the influence of warm easterly air mass over Malawi which is expected to be unstable at times.

“As from Friday, December 17 to Sunday December 19, most areas over the South, Centre and North are expected to experience significant outbreak of thunderstorms with the heaviest episodes as from Saturday, December 18.

“The rainfall activities are likely to be accompanied by gusty and damaging winds, lighting with heavy rainfall that may cause flash floods  in flood-prone areas of the country due to the presence of the much-awaited rainfall bearing system, namely the Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone which is expected to be active over the country.

The highest maximum temperatures for the past week were 42 degrees Celsius recorded at Ngabu in the South on December 8; Centre was 36 degrees Celsius at Salima on December 11 and 36 degrees Celsius at Karonga in the North on December 11.

Meanwhile, the Department of Climate Change & Meteorological Services says “regardless of the type of weather conditions the public is encouraged to “always protect each other from CoVID-19 by wearing a face mask and keeping social distance in public places”.

As of Monday, Malawi registered 115 new CoVID-19 cases, eight new recoveries and zero new deaths.

Cumulatively, Malawi has recorded 62,380 cases including 2,308 deaths at case fatality rate of 3.70% while cumulatively, 58,863 cases have now recovered (at recovery rate of 94.36%) — bringing the total number of active cases to 977.

There were three new admissions and one new discharge in the treatment units in the past 24 hours of Monday bring to nine active cases currently hospitalised — five in Lilongwe, three in Blantyre and one in Mzimba North districts.

The positive cases out of the total number tested translates to a positivity rate of 14.65% and the weekly positivity rate (seven days moving average) is at 7.2%.

On COVID-19 vaccination, a total of 1,560,093 vaccine doses have been administered in the country so far with 925,184 having received their first dose and 351,068 their second of AstraZeneca vaccine respectively whilst 283,841 received Johnson and Johnson.

Over the past 24 hours of Monday, 5,181 and 1,477 people have received first dose and second of AstraZeneca vaccine respectively whilst 88 received Johnson and Johnson — bring a total of 634,909 people fully vaccinated.